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BANCROFT LIBRARY

University of California • Berkeley

IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

The " Grizzly Giant," Mariposa Grove, Yosevnite. Circumference at the ground, 91 feet;
eleven feet al>ove base, 64 feet 3 inches.

[Frontispiece.

Impressions of America

T. C. PORTER

.)/..-?., Oxon ; I. ate Scholar of Exeter College \ Oxford; Fellow of the Chemical Society ,
of the Royal Astronomical Society ; and of (lie Physical Society of London

ILLUSTRATED WITH DIAGRAMS AND STEREOSCOPIC VIEWS

Xondon
C. ARTHUR PEARSON LIMITED

HENRIETTA STREET W.C.
1899

PREFACE

OW this book came to be written,
and the objects of the writer in
publishing it, will be found at the
end of the narrative itself : the
author feels, however, that a few
words on the subject of the illus-
trations, and more especially on the particular
way in which the original photographs have been
reproduced, are rendered almost necessary by the
fact that many people scarcely understand the use
of stereoscopic views, and very few indeed are
aware that to use the pictures, no instrument
besides the two eyes is absolutely necessary.
First, then, as to the object of the pair of views
which constitute each plate. A first sight these
look exactly alike, but they are not so. Since the
two eyes of a person looking at a view of any
description are about three inches apart, he sees
it differently with each eye : each eye has, in
fact, its own point of view. How is it then, he
may ask, that he is not conscious of the two
different views? The answer is that in the

viii PREFACE

brain the two pictures are blended into one,—
how, no one knows, — and the brain recognises
the differences in the two pictures as what is
called "relief" in the different objects it sees:
they "stand out" solid, separate, and distinct from
one another, in a degree unattainable by the use
of one eye only : using both, we see them in
"stereoscopic relief."

To return to the illustrations in this book.
The left-hand picture of every pair represents the
particular view as seen by the left eye, and the
other, the same view as seen by the right eye at
the same time ; and we have only to devise some
means of seeing each view with the proper eye,
and that eye only, to cause the observer to see
the photographic representation of the view in
all the original's "relief." It will no longer look
flat, but the different distances of objects stretch-
ing away, one after another, into the distance,
will be as clearly visible as they were to the
author when he was taking the photograph. The
result is that the picture becomes so much more
" real " and intelligible, that the writer thinks
it worth a considerable amount of trouble to
acquire the power of seeing the views stereo-
scopically either by means of a stereoscope, such
as is supplied with this book, or, — though in
most cases it demands some little perseverance,
—by the method to be presently described which
needs no instrument, and which, when once learnt,
cannot be forgotten and is perfectly easy.

To learn how to see the views in this book
in stereoscopic relief without using a stereo-
scope : —

PREFACE ix

(1) Hold up the forefinger of your right hand
in front of your nose, and about a foot away from
it : fix the eyes, not on the finger, but on some
object in front of you, but MUCH further off; and
while looking at the distant object, fix your atten-
tion on the finger, and close first one eye, and
then the other, noting how the finger seems to
change its position. Repeat this two or three times,
and then open both eyes, still looking at the
distant object, and still keeping your attention
fixed upon the finger : you will now see TWO
fingers, one of them being caused by the right
eye, the other by the left : moreover, if you move
the forefinger nearer to your nose, you will notice
its two images move further apart, and, of course,
if you move your forefinger further away from
your nose, its two images will move nearer
together. You must make quite certain of this
step before going on to the next.

(2) Make a letter V with the fore and second
fingers of the right hand, and hold them up as
before, only rather further from your nose; go
through exactly the same performances as in (i) :
this time you will find that with both eyes open
there are two images of the V seen, which
together form a W, and if you consider the
two middle strokes of this W, it will be evident
that the left stroke is the image of the forefinger
formed by the right eye, whilst the right stroke
is the image of the second finger formed by the
left eye : shutting first one eye and then the
other will convince you at once of this. The
important fact so far as we are concerned is,
that these two images overlap, so that if we can

x PREFACE

perform the same operations with two stereo-
scopic views instead of the two fingers, we can
see two images of the views on the outside, cor-
responding to the two outer strokes of the W,
here described ; and between them two over-
lapping views, corresponding to the two inner
strokes of the W, one of which overlapping views
is the image of the scene as viewed by the right
eye when the photograph was taken, and the
other is that of the same scene as viewed by the
left eye : if, then, we can bring these two images
into as exact coincidence as possible, we shall see
the view in stereoscopic relief.

Turn back now to(i), i.e. the experiment with
the forefinger alone, and keeping the attention
fixed on the finger, look first at some object not
very far behind the finger (i.e. on the side of it
away from the eye), and then at some object
much further off: you will notice that the further
off is the object at which you look, the greater is
the distance between the two images of the finger,
so that by looking at an object a suitable distance
away, the two images of the forefinger may be
made to move as far apart as we wish, within
certain limits. It is in this way that we can bring
the two stereoscopic pictures into coincidence, and
although it is impossible to avoid a somewhat
tedious description of this method, in practice it
is quite easy, especially after a person has once
succeeded.

(3) Look then at some distant object, and
keeping the gaze fixed on it, move up into the
position formerly occupied by the forefinger, the
blank paper (Fig. A) with the dot in the middle :

Fig. A.
I*

xii PREFACE

just as before you saw two fingers, you will now
see two dots. Of course as the paper is not
transparent, it will hide the distant object from
view, but a very little practice will enable you to
keep the eyes exactly as they were when the
distant object was in sight. Now do the same
with Fig. B, with the two dots, and by a few trials
choose the distant object at such a distance that
the middle two images of the dots coincide : do
exactly the same with Fig. C, looking first at the
dots as you did last time, and when you have got
the two middle images of the dots to coincide,
transfer the attention to the cube above them,

STILL KEEPING THE EYES AS WHEN LOOKING AT
THE DISTANT OBJECT : YOU WILL NOW SEE THIS
CUBE IN STEREOSCOPIC RELIEF.

Lastly, take any of the stereoscopic plates — one
with considerable contrast will probably prove
easiest — and do exactly the same with it : the
middle image of the three visible will be in
stereoscopic relief, and the reader will probably
think the result well worth the trouble he has
taken. If he is still unsuccessful, he should make
two dots with ink directly beneath the two repre-
sentations of the same object in one of the pairs
of views, and proceed exactly as in the case of
the dots and cubes illustration. In the writer's
opinion, if his eyes are not very abnormal, he
cannot fail to succeed.

The two views should be held in a good light,
and should be as equally illuminated as possible :
the nearer the two dots or stereoscopic views are
to each other, the easier it is to make the required
coincidence ; and if the reader finds himself

Fig. B

xiv PREFACE

unable at first to bring about the coincidence of
the two middle dots in the foregoing illustrations,
he had better draw for himself two dots on a half
sheet of notepaper, rather nearer together than
those in the book, and try with these first, and
then with others, a little further apart, until he
can manage without difficulty those in the book.
Some people will take much longer than others
to acquire the power ; and it will be easiest for
those whose eyes are by nature rather far apart :
the wider the space between corresponding
objects in the pair of stereoscopic pictures, the
more difficult will they be, but in practice it
appears that all the illustrations in this book can
be viewed stereoscopically by the unaided eyes
without difficulty, though some are a little harder
than others.

If the stereoscope supplied is used, owing
to the magnification given by all such instru-
ments, the "grain" of the reproduced photograph
becomes visible, which, of course, is to be re-
gretted : in apology, the writer need only say
that the very finest dotted screens have been
employed of which the "half-tone" process is at
present susceptible, and that any other process
would have made the book very much more
expensive. He feels, too, that the granularity,
visible though it be, will not seriously interfere
with the enjoyment he hopes this particular way
of viewing the illustrations may give to his
readers.

Those who already possess stereoscopes which
cannot be well used for illustrations bound within
covers, can easily cut the pictures out of the book,

u

XV11

and look at them with their instrument as they
generally do.

The writer would like to add that the only
book he has met with containing stereoscopic
plates is one on the peak of Tenerife, by Pro-
fessor Piazzi Smythe. At the time this was
published, however, no form of stereoscope could
be made sufficiently cheap and portable to accom-
pany the little book ; had it been otherwise, no
doubt the Astronomer Royal for Scotland would
have adopted much the same course as the writer,
who hopes that his effort to popularise this long-
neglected instrument may not prove wholly un-
successful. He would also take this opportunity
of pointing out that those who possess magic
lanterns can easily view their slides in stereoscopic
relief on the screen, and therefore life size, if
they wish, by printing the two views from the
stereoscopic " negative " on one lantern plate
(generally by reduction in the reducing camera),
projecting the two views on the screen, so that
the right eye's view is on the left, looking at
the screen, and the left eye's view on the right,
and then regarding them from a distance with the
lines of sight of the two eyes crossed so that each
eye sees its proper picture. The eyes can be
made to converge to the right degree without
effort, by looking at a finger, held about a foot
from the nose, whilst the ATTENTION is fixed upon
the views on the screen. Most people, in the
writer's experience, are successful after very few
trials, and are astonished at the result. The
screen itself disappears, and the observer, if the
picture before him be a landscape, sees it stretch-

XV111

PREFACE

ing away into the distance, the different objects
in it looking so real that, did he not know them
to be mere shadows, he would not doubt that
h^ could walk into the scene, and further convince
himself of their reality by touching them.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I

PAGE

Liverpool to Xew York — Railway travelling — The Hudson
river — Niagara by day — The Whirlpool rapids — Sulphur
Spring — The Falls by sunset, and by moonlight . . i

CHAPTER II

To Yellowstone Park by Chicago and St. Paul — Remarkable
clouds— Desert scenery — A storm — The "bad land" of
North Dakota — The Prairie — Cinnabar — The Devil's
Dyke — Mammoth Springs — The Terraces — Tameness of
the wild animals — A "hold up" — The Norris Geyser
Basin — A luckless Chinee — Black Growler — Crater
geyser — The Upper Basin — Eruption of the " Little
Fountain " — A victim — Feeding the wild bears — The
Upper Basin — Morning Glory — Another victim — Ex-
celsior geyser — Grotto, Splendid, and Giant geysers —
Old Faithful — Grand eruptions— The Castle, Lion and
Cubs, and Riverside geysers — Fire-hole Lake and its
mysterious flames — The Great Fountain — Narrow escape
— Thunderstorm and eruption of the Little Fountain —
Wonderful colours of a pool — Uncanny spiders — The
Mammoth Paint-pots— Stalking the hears — Snap shots —
The Timber Wolf — A smoking plain — The Lone Star
geyser — Twisted tree trunks 24

CHAPTER III

Yellowstone Lake — The Captain disagrees with the Pro-
fe^sors — Antelope — Buffalo — Pelicans — The cubs — Mud
volcano — Approach to the Grand Carton of the Ycllow-
>tone — The Upper Fall — First impressions — Look-out

xx CONTENTS

PAGE

Point — Eagles — Marvellous colouring — Sunset in the
Cafton — Virginia cascade — Norris Basin again — Beaver
Lodge — Dams — We leave the Park —California — The
Shasta route — Forest fires 75

CHAPTER IV

San Francisco — Cliff House — Seal rocks — Raymond — The
drive to Yosemite — Mines — The forests — Rough roads —
First view of the Valley — Inspiration Point — Yosemite
and the Norwegian Naerodal compared — The Bridal
Veil and Yosemite Falls — Cathedral spires — El Capitan
— Sentinel Hotel — Magnificent scenery — Happy Island —
Ascent of Clouds' Rest — View from the summit — The
Sierra — Mirror Lake — A lovely sunrise — Glacier Point
trail— The High Sierra — An unwelcome visitor — Echoes
— The Mariposa grove of big trees — Back to Raymond
— An unfortunate pig — The Road-runner — A rude
awakening — San Francisco again 108

CHAPTER V

China Town — Opium smoking — A remarkable cat — A joss
house — The theatre — A long play — Chinese music —
Shopping 143

CHAPTER VI

Snow sheds — Across the Desert to Salt Lake City — Mor-
monisrn — Brigham Young — The water of the Salt Lake
— Disagreeable effects — Colorado — Glenwood Springs —
The Royal Gorge — A lava stream — Colorado Springs —
The Garden of the Gods — Manitou — Pike's Peak — Night
on the Peak — A clear morning — Ute Pass and Cascade
Canon — Labour Day 151

CHAPTER VII

Monument Park— Earth pillars— The Seven Lakes — An im-
promptu camp — Cheyenne Canons — The Seven Falls —
The Kinematoscope 171

CHAPTER VIII

Williams' Canon — Manitou Grand Cavern — The Organ
— Across the Prairie — A hot journey — Kansas City —
Crossing the Mississippi — Washington — Jersey City —
Reflections — Tarry Town — A quiet evening — The Statue
of Liberty — Farewell to America 195

COXTKXTS xxi

APPENDICES.

PAGE

I. THE GULF STREAM : Is IT PERIODIC? . . . .211

II. ON THE INCREASE IN THE APPARENT BREADTH OF THE
AMERICAN FALL, DUE TO THE LINES OF FALLING
FOAM 220

III. MIRAGE 224

IV. SOME OBSERVATIONS ON TEMPERATURE, MADE AT THE

BASE OF THE CANADIAN FALL .... 226

V. PHOTOGRAPHIC METHODS 227

VI. GEYSERS: A NEW THEORY 228

VII. PHYSIOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS ON THE SUMMIT OF

PIKE'S PEAK 241

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

PAGE

The " Grizzly Giant," Mariposa Grove, Yosemite . Frontispiece
Plates A, B, C . . . . . . Preface

Whales Spouting ...... 3

The Gulf Stream ...... 4

Mirage on the Gulf Stream .... 5

Horse-Shoe Fall, Niagara, from Clifton House (Plate I.) . 7
American Fall, Niagara, from the Suspension Bridge

(Plate II.) ii

The Brink of the Horse-Shoe Fall, Niagara, from Goat

Island (Plate III.) 15

Part of the Whirlpool Rapids in the Gorge below Niagara

Falls (Plate IV.) 19

The " Bad Lands" of Dakota and Thunder-clouds (Plate V.) 27
The " Little Fountain " Geyser in Eruption, evening light

(Plate VI.) 35

Eruption of " Old Faithful," Upper Geyser Basin, Yellow-
stone Park (Plate VII.) . . . . -39

Eruption of " Old Faithful," from the West (Plate VIII.) 43
Geyserite (Siliceous) Terraces, with pools of hot water, on

the S.W. slope of the cone of "Old Faithful " (Plate IX.) 45

Eruption of " Old Faithful," from the East (Plate X.) . 49

The Grotto Geyser, Upper Basin, Yellowstone Park (Plate XI.) 51

The Throat of the " Great Fountain " Geyser (Plate XII.) . 55

Mud Caldron, " The Mammoth Paint-pot " (Plate XIII.) 59

Part of the Crater of the Mud Caldron (Plate XIV.) . . 61

Black Hear ( I'hite XV.) . ... 65
Spiral Cracks on the Pine . . . . -67

xxiv LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

PAGE

Cone of the " Lone Star " Geyser (Plate XVI.) . 69

Eruption of the " Lone Star" Geyser (Plate XVII.) . . 71

Crater of the Mud Volcano, Hayden Valley (Plate XVIII.) 79
The Brink of the Lower Fall of the Yellowstone River

(Plate XIX.) 83

The Lower Fall of the Yellowstone River (Plate XX.) 85

The Yellowstone Canon (Plate XXI.) . . 89
The first few feet of the Lower Fall of the Yellowstone

River (Plate XXII.) ... .91

Dams made by Beavers across Beaver Lake (Plate XXIII.) . 95

Pulpit Terrace, Mammoth Hot Springs (Plate XXIV.) . 97

Minerva Terrace (Plate XXV.) . . . . . 101

Minerva Terrace from the East (Plate XXVI.) . . 103

Yosemite Valley from Inspiration Point (Plate XXVII.) . 109

The Naerodal, Norway (Plate XXVIII.) ... 113
The Yosemite Valley from the Summit of Cloud's Rest

(Plate XXIX.) 121

Mirror Lake (Plate XXX.) 125

The Half Dome, Cloud's Rest, and Tenieya Canon, Yosemite

(Plate XXXI.) .... .129

The Sierra from Glacier Point (Plate XXXII.) . . 133

Through the big tree "Wawona" (Plate XXXIII.) . . 137

Big Trees in the Mariposa Grove, Yosemite (Plate XXXIV.) 139
The Great Salt Lake Desert (Plate XXXV.) . . .153

Red Rocks in the Garden of the Gods (Plate XXXVI.) . 161

Colorado Springs and the Prairie (Plate XXXVII.) . . 167

" Earth Pillar " and Pike's Peak, Colorado (Plate XXXVIII.) 173
Earth Pillars, " Monument Park," Colorado Springs (Plate

XXXIX.) 175

Scene in " Monument Park " (Plate XL.) . . . 179

Group of Earth Pillars, " Monument Park" (Plate XLI.) 183

Chipman Squirrel (Plate XLI I.) .... 191

Mirage in the Gulf Stream . . . . .214

Bottle Chart . . . . . . .216

Diagrams illustrating the Bottle Chart . . . 217

Two Views of Niagara Falls illustrating Perspective . 221

Squares illustrating " Perspective "... 223

Diagrams illustrating Mirage ..... 225

Diagram illustrating the Action of a Geyser . . 231

Diagrams illustrating the Outcrop Tubes of a Geyser . 235

Diagram illustrating the Action of a Geyser . . 238

CHAPTER I

E are close to New York at the
time this simple story begins,
after a voyage of six days—
the first from Liverpool to
Mizen Head, South Ireland, in
calm weather, with smooth sea
and cloudy sky. The outlines of Erin looked
very grey and peaceful in the early morning
light. At Queenstown entrance, three or four
boats put out to meet us, and the fine-looking
Irish women in them lost no chance of selling
their laces and shawls whilst we waited for the
overland mail. Soon the short, squat, sturdy-
looking paddle-boat came alongside, and for
about a quarter of an hour the crew swarmed like
ants in a double line along the two gangways,
carrying aboard their sackfuls of letters addressed
to all quarters of the globe. When these came
to an end, the bags and portmanteaux of the few
passengers to be added to our list kept them busy
for a few minutes, and then, with the gangway,
the last link between ourselves and the Old World

2 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

was withdrawn, and we steamed away from the
post-office boat, waving our final farewells.

It was Sunday morning, and though dull, and
followed by a dull Monday, the sea was as
smooth as could be wished. Our progress
seemed to be generally about 470 to 490 sea
miles in the twenty- four hours, and every night
in the smoking-room a pool was formed by those
who were ready to back their opinions as to the
length of the day's run, often holding nearly ^18.
The tickets were sold by two spirited auctioneers,
on one of whose cards I saw the interesting and
rather ambitious titles—

" The Eastern Mystic

and
Prince of Orators."

Several of the bidders, I believe, had little to bid
with, but they did not seem to hesitate to give
their ten or fifteen shillings with the rest.

On Tuesday night we struck the north-west
edge of a cyclone ; the wind was fairly strong
from the north-east, but, as one could predict, it
grew gradually weaker, and by Wednesday at
noon had almost died away. It was fairly cold
whilst this wind lasted, and damp too, with fine,
drizzling rain. Then followed light north winds,
and a gleam or two of sunshine, and by Thursday
morning, off the banks of Newfoundland, we had
entered the fog, which lay on the outskirts of
the main mass of mist, in very long fingers
pointing south. The water's colour changed two
or three times in the course of the day from
ultramarine to deep indigo, or the reverse : now

IMPRESSIONS OF AMKKICA 3

and then, however, it looked almost black when
viewed perpendicularly, with scarcely a tinge of
i^rcen, even in the foam.

A. whale had been sighted in the distance about
three on Wednesday afternoon ; two or three
more were seen on Thursday, and one at least on
Friday. They appeared just above the water,
thus : —

f~ i ' . /

* """^-^^^^^^^

or when they "spouted," sent up a sudden squirt
for some four or five feet into the air. This
blowing lasted little more than a second, and
their movements were far from easy to follow so
far off. But though the whales were disappointing,
the porpoises amused us much. Twice we saw
small schools of them, swimming in column, two
or three deep, and leaping out of the water beau-
tifully, a rank at a time. Once we could follow
them swimming beneath the surface obliquely
towards the ship. They are friendly-looking
things, very plump, with dark grey backs,
yellowish-white beneath. We saw no birds of
any kind in Mid- Atlantic except two small ones,
which seemed to accompany the ship — flying
alongside by day, and, I suppose, resting in the

4 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

rigging by night. On Thursday I made the
acquaintance of Mr. B., third officer, with whom
I had a most interesting conversation, on the Gulf
Stream. By throwing overboard at known spots
bottles of clear glass, with instructions to the finder
enclosed, and making a chart of their course, in-
ferred from the places where they are found, the
ocean currents are being unravelled slowly. I

When the Gulf Stream meets cold air it forms
a fog extending high over the warm water ; on
the other hand, when a cold stream meets warm
air the fog is very superficial — only a few feet
deep — and is called a "shaver." Often there is
a distinct line on the surface between the Gulf
Stream and the colder water " as clean as could
be cut with a knife " ; and generally there will be
a breeze along the surface of the cold water
towards the warm which dies suddenly and
completely when the warm current is reached.
This is satisfactorily and easily explained in the
same way as the " sea-breeze " is.

1 See Appendix.

IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA 5

Again, a curious mirage is often noticed thus : —

This is easily explained by refraction of rays
from points on and beyond the real horizon—
upwards, over the warm water, and downwards
over the cold.1

The captain told me a yarn of a predecessor
of his, a stern disciplinarian. One day when he
was using the sextant, the sun was obscured by a
small cloud at the very moment when it was
required clear, and the mate, who was standing by
watching his chief, said to him, "I'm afraid that
cloud prevented you from making an observa-
tion." " It has not hindered you at all events,"
was the instant reply.

Our cabin was exceedingly comfortable, and
the passage an exceptionally fast one, for the
Etruria made her record run, and so we reached
New York about eight o'clock on Saturday
morning, and by nine had our luggage inspected
- everything being opened -- and drove off
through strikingly handsome streets to the
Murray Hill Hotel, using the time we had to
stay in the city in visiting a bank and trying the
elevated railway. It was a hot day, and the
streets were very tiring.

What impressed me most at first sight was the
height of the buildings, some of them twenty
storeys and more ; and also the absence of

1 See Appendix.

6 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

smoke, perhaps mainly due to the season, as
well as to the universal use of electricity. The
steamer connection across the river is exceedingly
good ; every street of any importance ending on
the river frontage has its busy little boat plying
constantly between it and the opposite shore, so
that the waters of the Hudson are very animated.
No city that I have ever seen looked so busy,
and at the same time so bright and clean. It
gives you the idea of covering an immense area,
and the long ride we took in one direction on an
electric car strengthened this impression. The
people look as if they worked hard, but had
recreation too. Our stay was, of course, too
short to get more than a rough idea. Brooklyn
Bridge is magnificent, and the towers which bear
the chains at either end are wonderfully light in
structure, compared with any that I have seen in
England.

That evening, as the train carried us swiftly
along the broad, tranquil Hudson River, we
passed through scenes of wonderful beauty :—
bold rounded headlands of red rock, wooded
from top to bottom, recalling Devonshire,—
villages, towns, and country villas, nestling
amid the trees, on the lower slopes, — yachts,
with their white and brown sails perfectly
reflected in the smooth waters — dreams of home
scenery, like the Dart and the Tamar : a little
later, and we plunged into the thick woods ; but
it rapidly grew dark, and time for dinner. Black
waiters handed us dainty dishes and iced drinks.
The cars are models of comfort, with smoking,
dressing, and sleeping compartments, all brilliantly

IMPRESSION'S OK AMKRK'A 9

lit up by a gas which burnt with an unusually
white flame, and gave an excellent light for
reading.1 Boys came round with papers and
magazines, leaving several for examination, and
were not at all grieved or surprised if on their
return none were purchased. And so at last to
bed : but although the berth seemed large after
the ship's closer quarters, to sleep was not easy,
for the pace of the train was very great, and the
oscillations violent.

Next morning, about six, we passed through
Buffalo, and with only the glimpse of a distant flash
of white foam, which may or may not have been
the Falls, steamed into Niagara station, and thence
drove across the suspension bridge to the Canadian
side, putting up at the Clifton, which has a superb
view of both American and Horse-Shoe cataracts
(Plate I.). Of these hundreds of descriptions have
been written. Many I have read, and from them
and from photographs of the Falls, and especially
from the moving pictures, one may get a rough
idea of what they are like. We learn that there
are practically two distinct falls, with a full quarter-
mile of island between them, and that the American
is a few feet higher than the Canadian, or Horse-
Shoe. Guide-books, in the style that is peculiar
to them, tell you that the St. Lawrence is a mile
wide at the place where it makes its great leap of
1 60 odd feet. Ruskin describes the rush of water
at the rounded brink of the precipice as " sheer
polished velocity," yet no descriptions I have read
or heard from friends quite prepared me for what
I saw. The American Fall is very graceful.
' I'crhaps ethylene, or a mixture of coal gas and acetylene.

io IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

Doubtless the tall parallel furrows in the white
foam make it look rather broader and not quite
so higfh as it would seem without them.1 It does

o

not, however, produce any feeling of awe, even
when the Maid of the Mist — as the little steamer
is called — takes you close to the base, where the
huge fallen rocks form a kind of rampart, through
which the new foamy water rushes in milk-white
streams. Viewed from the opposite side (Plate II.),
this fall looks far less the work of Nature than
many really artificial waterfalls I have seen — its
lip is so straight and level. The water is a pale
brownish-green only for the first six or eight feet
down ; it then becomes broken into spray, and
remains snow-white for the rest of its descent.
From its base long rolling clouds of mist are
blown out over the water and rise, but soon
melt into the air, and seldom ascend to the
level of the brink. One cannot possibly criticise
so calmly the vision which meets the eyes if they
turn further to the west (see Plate I.), past the dry,
ruddy face of the precipices beneath the dark trees
of Goat Island. There, on the left, nearly a
mile away, the sunshine kindles to transcendent
whiteness a curved cliff of foam ; and from
just behind it bursts forth cloud after cloud of
spray as though fired from a thousand guns, now
rolling up billow on billow, now in countless
spear-points of water turning at once to the
finest mist — a mist which floats across the
gorge, and rises broad and triumphant, decked
with snow-white plumes and feather sprays, until,
a mass of silver cloud, it drifts away across the
1 Vide Appendix.

IF

IMPK'KSSIOXS OF AMKRICA i ;,

summer sky. Just above this cloud of foam the
great body of the river's water comes over in one
massive, unbroken liquid wall of clearest emerald,
fretted and flecked with falling crescents of foam,
coruscating and scintillating in the sunshine.
Here and there, on the arch of the water,
flash, for an instant, drawn-out reflections of
the sun like glittering threads of fire ; but it is
impossible for any one to put into words the
look of irresistible power, of overwhelming
strength, and crushing weight of that translucent
mass of crystal. The Maid of the Mist ventures
not near where the mighty river crashes into the
waters below, lest the return current — swift and
strong — should sweep her to instant destruction.
The thunder of the conflict shakes the land for
a long distance round,1 and for three hundred
feet or more from the bottom of this fall, the
broad surface of the river is one seething and
hissing mass of foam, tossed with waves hurrying
from side to side.

On our first day we drove to the most inte-
resting spots on the American side, and ex-
plored them all rather hastily. The Terrapin
tower no longer stands on the rock at the
edge of the Horse-Shoe Fall (Plate III.); they
say that people persisted in climbing it and
getting into danger, so that it was judged best
to consign it to the mercies of dynamite, and
thus it met its fate and went over the falls
many years before it would naturally have

1 At night we felt it quite distinctly in Clifton House —
rattling loose windows. It is wonderful to think that this
goes on always.

i4 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

perished -- for sooner or later this is what
happens to everything near the brink. Looking
down into the shallow border of the river near
the lip of the American fall, one can see how
the rocks disintegrate. Cracks at first very
narrow slowly widen every year, until the
loosened slabs are suddenly torn asunder and
whirled away to join what is left of their former
neighbours at the bottom of the abyss, where they
are first shattered and then ground to powder.

Clad in tarpaulin, and looking like seals and
penguins, we descended to the path cut in the
rock, which leads behind the first few ribs of the
western part of the Horse- Shoe, and were duly
drenched in the fringe of the fall. I found the
temperature of the air and water mixed, and
falling in torrents of drops on the thermometer
held at arm's length and drenched for three or
four minutes, was 21° C. exactly ; the same was
the temperature of the air full of fine mist
outside the thick spray and at the level of the
water flowing away from the fall ; whilst the
actual stream of water flowing from the base of
the same torrent of spray was at 22-3° C. at
least, and may have been as much as 22-5° C., but
stooping down to read the instrument immersed
beneath the broken stream, with blasts of wind
driving thick spray into eyes and mouth, so that
one could scarcely breathe, it was not easy to
make sure of the decimal as the scale marked
whole degrees. I feel certain, however, that the
reading was within the limits I have stated, and
if so it is rather strange that there should be
i *3° C. difference between the spray, which after

IMl'RKSSIOXS OF AMERICA 17

falling makes the stream, only two or three feet
above the water's surface, and the stream itself.1
All was in the shade, though a brilliant sun was
shining above the fall.

We watched logs of wood, which had come
over the falls, quietly stand on end and disappear
in the vortex of the whirlpool, not to see daylight
again for four miles down stream. We admired
the wonderful Whirlpool rapids with their raging
waves. I photographed the wildest spot of all
—where Captain Webb was seen for the last
time (Plate IV.). A man in a padded tub made
the descent from the foot of the American fall
to the shore of the Whirlpool, on which by
good luck he stranded, in fourteen minutes ;
on opening the tub he was found more dead
than alive, but he recovered. One other, the
captain of a former Maid of the Mist, navi-
gated this terrible stream in safety. He had
fallen into debt, and was warned that the
bailiffs were coming for him. For love of his
Maid, and resolved that she should never be
taken from him to pay his debts, he determined
to risk his own life with his boat's, and turned
her head down stream. Together they en-
countered the thousand rock-demons of that
mile of wild surf, and, after some madly ex-
citing moments, sailed safe and sound into the
calm, free waters of British Ontario.

I visited the strange " Sulphur Spring " above

the falls, where, in a space boarded round, gas

comes rushing up through the black waters of a

small pool, making them seem to boil violently.

1 Vide Appendix.

18 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

The unlit gas contains sulphuretted hydrogen—
of that there is no doubt. When a light is
applied it catches fire with a burst of flame,
reddish-yellow near the base, and in the central
part, bright, like the flame of coal gas.

There was but little smell of sulphur dioxide,
and from this fact, as well as from the appearance
of the flame and its spectrum, it seemed to be
mainly methane — or perhaps a mixture of methane,
ethane, and other hydrocarbons. The spectrum
was rather curious — I only made a very rough
observation with a small pocket spectroscope ; it
showed on a fairly bright continuous band an
intense sodium line (I suppose it was sodium,
though my instrument was too feeble to show the
line double), also a dull reddish orange line, so
faint as to look almost brown, situated on the less
refrangible side of the sodium, and a fairly bright
line in the green which seemed well defined on
both sides, and therefore could only doubtfully be
assigned to carbon. So "Sulphur Spring" is
only, as Tweedledee would say, what the spring
is called. What it is I cannot say exactly, but it
certainly is not chiefly either sulphur or com-
pounds of that element.1

1 The spring might be very easily imitated, by laying on a
copious supply of unpurified coal gas, and letting it bubble up
freely through very dirty water; by dissolving salts in the
water it would be quite easy to produce a spectrum rather
different from that of coal gas. In the actual spring, although
a considerable quantity of the gas escaped into the air before
being lit, I did not notice any odour like that of ordinary
coal gas ; still the sulphuretted hydrogen would mask, to a
considerable extent, any other smell. There might well be
some gold in such a spring, if the price of admission were
as high as the payment to see this " Sulphur " specimen !

-,

IMPKKSSIOXS <>!• AMKRICA ri

The Dufferin Isles are lovely, and the rapids
above the falls well worth visiting. The river is
so wide, that as one looks up stream and sees the
long lines of tumbling, broken water hurrying to
take • their last leap, it resembles sea rather than
river, and the cascades of snow-white foam against
a dark sky make a beautiful picture.

Strikingly grand as Niagara is under bright
sunshine, it is still more impressive at sunset and
by moonlight. To take the evening of Tuesday,
August ioth. for instance, we were then looking
at the American fall from the west. Near the
horizon lay a bank of heavy cumulus thunder-
clouds glowing in the orange and scarlet of sun-
set against a sky of pale saffron, piled up one
above another, like range upon range of very
lofty rounded snow-peaks. Filmy, salmon-
coloured stratus, in long level lines, cut the
upper slopes of these cloud mountains ; whilst
below them, and nearer, lay another range of
weird dark purple clouds, contrasting wonderfully
with the gorgeous hues of the distant giant range.
Sharp against the inky horizon leapt and tumbled
the amber breakers of the rapids, flanked with
deep warm green of foliage on Luna and Goat
Islands, the smoother patches of water reflecting
the pale blue of the sky nearer the zenith. The
tresses of the fall itself were all palest cream,
losing themselves in the glowing heart of the half
transparent foam wreaths l slowly curling up from
depths already growing dark in the shadow of the

1 This wonderful glow in the mist of the Horse-Shoe Fall is
the effect of the reflection of brilliant sunshine from the
smooth falling water on the spray.

22 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

cliffs. And who shall describe the wonders of the
Horse- Shoe Fall at this solemn hour ? Who shall
paint the subtle shades of the huge pillar of rosy
mist l ever rising to the sky, or the magic of the
clean-cut sheets of emerald descending close beside
this hazy, opal tower ? The day dies fast, — fleeting
is the glow of sunset, higher and higher climb the
cold blue shades of coming night, brighter and
brighter shines its gentle queen as she rises in
matchless tranquillity over the far-away storm
clouds, and Niagara, the sleepless, is meanwhile
transfigured from one glory to another.

That night, about eleven o'clock, from Table
Rock, which juts out over the waters, I saw the
Horse-Shoe Fall by the brilliant full moon, which
then stood over the rapids above the cataract, so
that the part of the water about the centre of the
great curve was in shadow, whilst to right and
left the light fell obliquely on the waters in their
descent. Palest grey are they, except just where
they curve over ; there, furrowed streaks of molten
silver form the highest lights in all the picture.
For a while the edges of the pillar of cloud lightly
veil the moon, deepening the ghostly shadows,
and the mystery of the depth below. Only the
thunder of the falling waters, even louder now
than by day, betray that they are real, so
visionary and ethereal do they look. Dark and
impenetrable, the serrated woods on either shore
guard the boundaries of the endless race of eager
waters, and over all the stars are glittering, set
in the high arch of night. So has the Indian

1 A rose-salmon colour next the sun, changing into pale
cobalt through all the mixtures of cobalt and light red.

IMPRESSIONS OF AMKRICA

looked upon it from afar in ages past, scarce
daring to approach the home of the Dread Spirit
of the Falls ; and so in ages yet to come,
shall all to whom Niagara unfolds her wondrous
visions, know that here the veil between the
visible and invisible grows thin ; they shall hear
the voice of the Great Spirit in the sound of
many waters, and see — if it be but the hem
of his garment — in the whiteness which no fuller
on earth can whiten.

The view from the top of the tower of the lift
on the American side is good, and shows a little
of Lakes Erie and Ontario ; only part of the
Horse-Shoe is visible, but the gorge lies open
just below you as far as the Whirlpool.

CHAPTER II

EXT day, Wednesday, August i ith,
we said farewell to Niagara after
a very fine glimpse of the falls
from the railway to Chicago. Of
that city we saw very little in the
short drive from station to station ;
it has the same tall buildings as New York. We
caught a glimpse of Lake Michigan just before
reaching Chicago, and as we ran along its
southern shore the waves were breaking on the
beach under the sunset sky, in a northerly breeze,
like the waves of an ocean.

On Thursday morning we reached St. Paul-
after travelling through scenery something like
the tamest of English landscapes — and left again
by the Northern Pacific in the afternoon. The
dust was a nuisance for the first time, and the
dining car intolerably hot, as the windows had to
be closed to prevent the dust from getting in.
This plague of the desert is almost impalpable—
not gritty, more like mould. All day the clouds
have been one stately procession of heavy cumulus,
(Plate V.) floating in a bright blue sky, but different

IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA 25

from any I have seen in the prevailing shape which
is columnar, getting thicker at the top, like the
stumps of pollard willows, or like elongated
broccoli flowers.

About 2 a.m. one of the grease boxes, which
keep the axles of the car-wheels cool, got very
hot and emitted volumes of dense black smoke ;
we had to stop several times before the remedies
were successful. Meantime a severe thunder-
storm was in progress. I watched it for over an
hour ; the lightning was, at first, white, and later
on, yellow ; the thunder, of the single-explosion
type — not sounding like heavy boxes pitched down
a long, carpetless, wooden staircase, still less of a
boom and rumble, and also different from the
hollow roar I have often noticed on semi-tropical
sea-coasts. Over and over again there would be
two loud cracks of thunder with an interval of,
say, thirty seconds between them, but not a
glimmer of lightning visible * ; then would come a
blinding flash and an explosion about a second
afterwards. Then a longish interval, with perhaps
another flash and its peal, and then two peals
again unaccompanied by lightning. Occasion-
ally, very faint discharges occurred just before the
brilliant flashes, suggesting the preparation of a
way for them. This was, at last, followed by
very heavy rain and wind. For a long while
there had been scarcely any — only a few pattering
drops falling. We had already crossed the
Mississippi, laden with timber, at Minneapolis ;
and now, about six or seven in the morning, the

1 The night was very dark, in spite of the nearly full moon,
and I should certainly have noticed even a faint flash.

3

26 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

Missouri lay beneath us, a very wide, dirty-yellow
river with mud banks. After breakfast nothing
met the eye but undulating country, with toy hills
and tiny watercourses marked green with rushes
and shrubs. Short grass, brown and burnt-
looking, covered it, mixed with a herb resembling
lavender. Here and there small wooden huts or
houses, with a few horses, cattle, and sheep
scattered round them, marked a farm ; but for
the most part it was barren and lifeless. Never-
theless, in the clear, fresh morning air, the dust,
fortunately for us, having been laid by the night's
storms, the wide plains had a certain wild beauty
of their own. The hills were flat-topped, most of
them, and the sides of some of the streams sug-
gested canons already.

In the afternoon the "bad land" of North
Dakota was flitting by the windows on either side
—land which looked like the refuse-heaps of alkali
works poured out in mounds ten to fifty feet high,
and then worn into ruts by the rain (Plate V.).
The hills were all horizontally traversed, as we saw
them running from east to west, by rather widely
separated layers of some harder black material,
only an inch or two thick. It was here that the
Indians gave trouble about five or six years ago,
so one of the blacks said. The wind was north,
and this, with some storm showers, cooled the
air, and made travelling delightful in the "annex."

Some of the low cones recalled very forcibly
the Red Coolins of Skye, but, although like the
Coolins in colour and shape, they cannot be worn-
down volcanoes, for the very long lines of strata,
all inclined at the same gentle angle east and

IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA 29

west, and more steeply in sections lying north
and south, prove their watery birth. Although
built of a soft material, which seemed to the eye
a kind of sandstone, their sides are very steep ;
and this, as well as the depth to which even the
small rills cut themselves channels, indicate that
although this soil is too hard for the raindrops to
wash down, it is too soft to withstand the action of
the streams of water formed after the rain reaches
the surface. There was a beautiful sunset, the
shadow of the earth rising in the eastern sky so
well marked, that had I noticed the time it took
to reach the zenith, it might have served for a
rough determination of the least height to which
the atmosphere exists.1

Several prairie dogs we saw, some sitting up
like squirrels or kangaroos, and eating ; others
squatting low ; they took very little notice of the
train. Gradually the valley of the Yellowstone,
up which we are now travelling, becomes
more fertile, large fields of rather stunted
Indian corn and thick copses alternating with
tracts of desert which grows only short, coarse
grass, the lavender-like shrub, and very dwarf
cacti with bristles. The prairie dogs and their
mounds, like large mole-hills, only appear where
the lavender shrub is wanting. Tiny sunflowers
there were in great numbers, with dark eyes and
long, thin stalks ; a small pinkish-violet thistle
cropped up now and then, and a white flower in
patches. The full moon rose soon after sunset, and
it grew much colder. Next morning the aneroid

1 Some similar observations made later gave from 150 to
180 miles.

30 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

barometer marked 4,100 feet at Livingstone, so
that we had gone up some 900 feet in the night.
The lower part of the valley of the Yellowstone,
along which the railway runs, is about 3,200
feet above sea-level for miles and miles.

Friday night was only remarkable for the
occasional violent charges of the engine against
the carriages — I suppose after being detached
to take water, or perhaps exchanged for a
fresh engine. Once I was within an ace of
making a sudden and unpremeditated aerial
descent from my upper berth, but wide awake in a
moment, I saved both person and appearances
by instantly clinging like a bat to the sideboard.

Saturday morning broke brilliantly as usual,
and it was baking hot on the box seat of the
coach and six that plodded along the road to
Cinnabar. Soon after " Emigrant " we passed
on the right a very fine dyke, and an eagle's nest,
with one bird near it, high up on a sort of earth
pillar to the left of the road. There were several
frail plank bridges, whose strength we must have
tested pretty well in crossing. If it had not been
for the firs, aspens and willows, sunflowers, dwarf
cacti, poppies, and other flowers we could call by
no specific name, one narrow gorge might have
been Norwegian, or even in North Wales ; but
the hills above us all the way were bare except
for the pale bluish-green sage bushes, and the
ashy soil is of so strange a colour that it almost
matches them.

The scenery, in great part, brought Pedro Gil,
in Teneriffe, vividly to mind, for the hills looked
burnt up and arid to the last degree. The

IMPk'KSSlOXS OF AMKRICA 31

Devil's Slide is a magnificent pair of parallel
dykes, both tipped over towards the east, and
running the whole way down the face of one of the
lower spurs, with a smooth — perhaps water-worn
—channel between them, vermilion in the centre
and yellow ochre at the sides.

After dinner at the Mammoth Springs Hotel,
we went to see the terraces of carbonate of lime,
deposited by the hot waters in their course from
the boiling springs down the hill-side ; and won-
derful they are, both in form and colour — veined
marble staircases, a turquoise pool in every step.
I descended into the Devil's Kitchen by a
nearly vertical ladder, the rungs of which are a
trifle worn. It is a narrow tilted shaft, wider
below, and entirely coated within with the lime-
stone deposit. The Angel's Terrace was next
inspected and photographed. By the side of one
large pond of warm water, often used for bathing,
and surrounded by woods, two snipe were
wading. H. actually got within six feet of one of
them ; they both seemed quite tame, and paddled
about unconcerned whilst we watched them. No
one is allowed to molest the animals in the park ;
the penalty for breaking the protective laws is
severe — for instance, a man was fined 100 dollars
with six months' imprisonment for shooting an
elk. The pretty little chipman squirrel, shy
enough in most places, showed no signs of
uneasiness when we came almost near enough to
touch it, and continued busily eating fir-cones as
big as itself.

The Mammoth Springs Hotel is built over two
great caves, the main entrances to which are down

32 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

by the river three or four hundred yards off ; but
through some loose planks there is another
opening just outside the house. At the present
time there are many wild beasts in these caves.
They only come out after nightfall, and though
they are often seen sneaking round in quest of
scraps of food, they have never as yet harmed the
poultry, and seem to prefer hunting in the woods.
Amongst them are the polecats and coyotes, a
kind of wolf-dog. I asked if the polecats smelt
much. The man turned away his head with an
expressive " Teugh ! " which spoke volumes.
There are plenty of black bears near ; they do
not, however, attack men, nor do men attack
them in this region of peace. One evening this
summer a she-bear and her young one visited a
hotel not far away ; the young one came in and
sniffed about, whilst the mother waited outside.
After satisfying its curiosity the little bear walked
out again, and they went quietly away together.
It is not the beasts that are to be feared so much
as men ! This very morning, eight of the ordi-
nary coaches conveying tourists were " held up "
by two rascals masked with sacks pierced for
eye-holes, their feet padded to prevent their
leaving a trail, and armed with Winchester rifles
and revolvers. These two made the men, about
twenty in number, stand in a row with their
hands up, and, covering each in turn, forced them
to part with their money, thus collecting about
300 dollars. They are thought to be young hands
at the business, as they did not cut the wires
connecting the various coaching stations, and so
in a very short time every one in the district heard

IMPRESSIONS OK AMERICA

what had been done ; soldiers were sent for at
once, and arrived at about the same time that we
did ; but in spite of all this, the general opinion
seems to be that the men will not be caught.1
They treated the ladies civilly, asking them
whether they had any money, and taking their
word for it if they replied " No," as one or two
did. They did not search any one ; and at this
moment a tourist is boasting that he got off with a
loss of only ten dollars, whilst over two hundred
were in his coat pocket. It is supposed that one of
the robbers is a murderer who has been " wanted "
for some time, -and that either failure of pro-
visions, which seems scarcely likely, or want of
funds to leave the country, was the cause of the
attack. It is some years since the last raid of
the kind was made, and the event keeps a great
many tongues busy this evening. One lady is
said to have burst into tears on hearing of the
adventure of the " holding-up " party, so annoyed
was she at having missed the excitement !

Day broke with another cloudless morning, and
the air delightfully cool and fresh. With a pair
of capital horses, and relieved of our heavier
baggage, we started for the Norris, or Lower
Geyser Basin, which proved every bit as good as
the guide-books made out — the " Monarch," how-
ever would not play, and military police and the
lack of a box of soap rightly prevented any of the
more reckless spirits from hurrying his operations.
This way of precipitating an eruption was dis-
covered by a luckless Chinee, who, thinking that

1 Just before leaving America, it was rumoured that the
efforts of the police had proved successful.

34 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

much trouble might be saved in washing his
clothes by the use of a quiet-looking geyser pool,
proceeded to carry the thought into action ; when
suddenly his clothes and several tons of water
were ejected together, and the share he received
proved both hotter and heavier than he could
bear, and he was killed on the spot.

The roaring steam geyser, " Black Growler, "in
the Norris Basin, is now depositing a gelatinous
pure magnesium silicate ; my guide tells me that
this kind of deposit has only been forming during
the last two years. Two cases I saw, passing
strange, of a large geyser pool of boiling water
beautifully clear, and within a yard in one case
and only a foot and a half in the other lay a much
smaller pool, also of boiling water, but full of
precipitated sulphur, a mixture of the consistency
of very thin mud. It is difficult to explain the
entirely different character of springs so very close
together. One thing seems certain, their supply
pipes cannot have any connection. The " New
Crater " geyser is very fine ; it came into existence
about two years ago, with earthquakes and phe-
nomena resembling a true and explosive volcanic
eruption. A double crater was formed, large
stones being ejected, and now a geyser plays from
either one or the other, but never from both
together.

After waiting a short time by the " Monarch "
in vain, we set off again in our cosy little car, and
passed rapidly through some lovely pine forests,
first by Gibbon river, and down the Gibbon
canon with its pretty fall, and then by Fire- Hole
river, which teems with good fish. Sometimes

IMPRESSION'S OF AMERICA 37

we drove by boiling springs quite near the road
—Beryl spring for instance : at others we could
see only the steam rising amongst the trees. Two
cold springs of mineral water we tasted ; one, the
Apollinaris, bubbling with carbonic acid gas, the
other strongly impregnated with iron and soda,
tasting like ink. We heard, on our arrival at the
Upper Basin, that the Smaller Fountain geyser
was due to play, and I hastened to the spot,
camera in hand, and found a good many people,
some standing, some sitting, waiting for the
troubling of the clear waters of the pool, which
lies on the top of a broad, gently-sloping, dazzling
white terrace of silica. l Presently, the appearance
of a small jet, like that of a fire-plug, gave us warn-
ing, and caused a sudden retreat of the spectators
from the basin, and then up sprang a thick column
of water, about twelve feet high, whilst the spray
flew thirty or forty feet, and the dense cloud of
steam rose two or three hundred feet higher into
the air (Plate VI.). Suddenly the wind shifted,
and the descending shower of hot spray drenched
one of the spectators in a moment, but did not
hurt him much ; the others applauded vigorously,
whilst the victim himself retreated as fast as he
could from that side of the basin.

After dinner, we went to see the wild bears
come down to take the pickings the hotel people
put down for them on the outskirts of the wood to
the north of the hotel, and about four hundred
paces from it. We had not long to wait. Scarcely
had the cart carrying the refuse, and drawn by two

1 The substance of which sand is chiefly composed. Pure
silica is found crystallised as quartz

38 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

horses, deposited its load, when a large black bear
shuffled lazily out of the forest, easy to see, as
he crossed a white geyserite patch, and began
his meal about a hundred paces from the hotel
visitors. We watched him a long time ; I hoped
to see more, but no others appeared then, probably
because of the loud talking and laughter of some
of the people. The bears often come in large
numbers, seven or eight quite commonly, and
sometimes they actually try to climb up into the
cart. Although horses as a rule are rendered
almost mad with fright by a bear, or the scent of
one, those that drew this cart are quite accustomed
to their visitors, and take no notice of them
whatever. It is a strange sight to see. An old
backwoodsman, who knew Yellowstone some
years before any of the hotels were built, and
who had fought in no less than eighteen battles,
told me that his experience was that "If you
act fair by bears, the bears will act fair by you " :— -
and so with most animals, but not with ail-
not with the mountain lion !

Last evening, on returning from an intensely
hot and very active day in the Upper Basin, I
had no time or inclination to do more than change
my plates — a desperate performance when tired
out, and with nothing better than a pair of steps
to change them on. The consequence is, it is
difficult, even at one day's interval, to give
any adequate account of that home of geysers.
Perhaps the most lovely things of all we saw were
" Morning Glory " and, late in the afternoon,
the Emerald Pool. They are both indescribably
beautiful, and one could easily imagine be-

IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA 41

coming so enchanted with those clear crystal
depths as to draw nearer and nearer, till
with a fatal plunge all is ended — for in a few
minutes, so they say, a man's flesh boils to
r.i-s. In a horrible example, which one hopes
may be wholly untrue, but which was never-
theless mentioned as a fact, a man was trying
to sound the depth of one of these azure pools,
when the crust under foot gave way ; before
any adequate help could be given, a period of
three to five minutes according to the story, he
was hopelessly boiled, and only his skeleton took
the hook with which they fished for his remains !
The first great sight on the way to the Upper
Basin is " Excelsior," the water volcano : the
throat lies concealed in a boiling lake about three
hundred feet square. Its eruptions, which are
very rare, are simply appalling, the explosions
shaking the whole region. The water flows from
the lake into Fire- Hole river, down a terrace
streaked with the most gorgeous yellow, orange,
pink, brown and mauve tints. Near it is Sunset
Lake, a broad sheet of hot water, with exquisite
scalloped border, and lovely rippling shallows.
The Grotto geyser was on the point of playing
as we approached it. I photographed it before
the eruption began. Soon after a grand burst of
steam and a soaring column of spray told us that
the " Splendid " was playing ; we were very lucky
to see it, as it often has long and uncertain
periods of rest. The water flew two hundred feet
into the air, but before I could get my camera
ready the spectacle was over ; and though the
geyser played in the distance two hours after-

42 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

wards, and again two hours after that, and looked
as though a fourth outburst were imminent, when
we passed close by its basin in the afternoon, I did
not get a chance of taking it again. The " Giant,"
with a crater like the rent stump of a tree when
seen from outside, was also preparing to exert his
enormous strength and the three little "indicators"
which rise beside him were fuming and spouting
constantly ; but he did not get above just -boiling
over now and then, so we drove to the lunch
tent, and hearing that one of " Old Faithful's " ex-
hibitions was to be given in a short time, left at
once for a little plateau near him. Punctual to
the minute, as he almost always is, a low, thick
column of water rose from the white cone which
crowns his beautiful terrace formation ; then this
subsided and rose again a little higher, again
sank, and after a few seconds of breathless ex-
pectation, amidst dull sounding explosions of
steam, there burst forth the great fountain (Plate
VII.) — now and then sinking a little, and then soar-
ing far above the rolling clouds of vapour, shining
like silver in the bright sunshine (vide Plate VIII.),
and falling in shower after shower of liquid
diamonds, whilst the shallow basins below (vide
Plate IX.) were swept with glittering flashes, as
though watered with white fire. All the time,
flickering rainbows burnt in the sheets and fringes
of spray, and down the snow-white sculptured
terrace-steps flowed innumerable little cascades of
bubbling water, sparkling brightly. Gradually the
fountain grew lower, until at last it disappeared.
For a few minutes small domes of water would
burst over the cone, and fall into the side basins ;

IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA 47

then even this ceased, and the great geyser fell
asleep, to wake again after sixty-five minutes' rest.

Scarcely had I photographed this splendid sight,
and turned to inspect the Cascade geyser, which
was playing, when suddenly the "Castle" shot
up a column of steam and water with a loud roar.
This was unexpected, and we made our way down
the slope to it as fast as we could, but not fast
enough to get up to it before the best of its play
was over. It was a beautiful sight, even from a
distance, but the guides thought it a poor display
for this particular geyser, which sometimes-
according to them — sends aloft a spire of water
nearly two hundred feet high for fifteen minutes,
and then roars steam furiously for as long again.

After viewing the Castle from all sides we
crossed the meadow — if that marshy tract can be
so called — and the river by the ricketty plank
bridge, and met a boy who acted as guide to the
geysers and pools on the east side of the stream.
One of the " Lion's Cubs " was playing, but its
parents both slept. I photographed the young
one and its father; and then, passing the " Bee-
hive," which, much to our regret, did not play and
was not expected to, we examined one or two
pools and the Cascade geyser, and then made
our way back to " Old Faithful " to witness
his next outburst (Plate X.) from the east side.
It was magnificent, but a cloud came over the sun
and did not clear till just before the close, so that
I expect the photographs will be lacking in light
and shade, When all was over, with another
guide I walked past the Castle, taking a second
glimpse at the wonderful formation which lines its

48 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

inner walls, and then waited a few minutes to see
the small but perfectly regular " Economic."
All its water flows back into its throat after it
has played, and the eruptions occur every twelve
minutes. One would naturally expect in cases
like this, where the boiling water which has been
ejected in one eruption, and is still very hot, forms
the material for the next, that the period of repose
would be a short one — as it is.

Strolling further to the riverside geyser, we
witnessed a fine and long-lasting eruption. Its
surroundings of wood and river make it more
picturesque than many of the others, but it throws
the jets of water and steam obliquely across the
river, and the fountain is also oblique to the bank,
an arrangement of lines which is not so satis-
factory, in my opinion, as the perpendicular founts.
Here again the camera came into use. After
some little debate, we settled next to see the
" Emerald Pool," one of the loveliest imaginable ;
and then lingered some time by the " Splendid,"
which, as I have said, did not oblige us by repeat-
ing his morning performance. And so we turned
homewards, past the Grotto geyser (Plate XI.) and
gave a second look at the gigantic " Excelsior,"
the "Turquoise Spring," and " Sunset Lake";
and, in rather over an hour, saw the now familiar
lights of the Fountain Hotel, where the evening
quickly passed in dining, changing my photo-
graphic plates, and writing.

A trifle tired by our long days, we determined
to make our next rather easier ; so, soon after
breakfast, but not quite so early as usual, we set
out with our cheerful driver to the " Great

IMPRESSIONS OF AMKRICA 53

Fountain," about a mile and a half through the
woods, expecting it to play about 10 a.m. On
arriving, it seemed unready, so we drove to Fire-
hole Lake and inspected the extraordinary blue
flames, which seem to rise in two places under
the water. It was a showery morning, and an
easy proof that the appearance is not due to
flame was given when the sun suddenly flooded
the dark lake with light. The mysterious flames
became much brighter, whereas, if they had been
self-luminous, they must certainly have faded to
some extent. A second proof is, that they are
barely visible by bright moonlight. No one has,
so far as I could learn, attempted to see them in
the dark ; and no wonder, for the shore of the
lake is a crust of geyserite which is very unsafe
in places, not to mention the steam fog, which
always covers the surface of the ground round
these hot lakes at night.

Returning to the " Great Fountain," I had
barely time, in the rain which was falling, to set
up my camera, before its eruption began. Great
masses of water were thrown up by successive
explosions ; and once, above a broad base of
curling vapours, the boiling waters formed a
splendid column — probably two hundred feet high
—but it was only for an instant, and passed
before I had made the exposure of the plate ;
afterwards, it played grandly, but never attained
anything like this height, and the dull light was
not at all favourable to a worthy representation
of what I saw. Hoping to avoid the dense
clouds of steam, which the uncertain wind was
blowing now and then a great deal too near me

54 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

to be pleasant, I changed my position to the
opposite side of the wide basin ; but by that time
the geyser had apparently exhausted its powers,
and, after photographing the lovely pool terraces
round the opening, I walked across to inspect the
water seething in the throat, on the assurance of
the guide that all was safe. H. had already seen
it and retired. Scarcely had I got up to the lip
of the crater, when a renewed violent boiling and
splashing made me retreat rather rapidly. I
should have gone considerably faster but for a
large man in front, who blocked the narrow path
of planks in single file leading over the scalding
pools, and seemed dazed by the sounds behind
him. An explosion behind me made me run ; a
vast mass of boiling water again shot into the air,
but I had reached safety before the scalding
shower descended. After this I shall not be so
ready to believe the assurances of even the best
guides. The geyser, in fact, had only accom-
plished half its programme, and played grandly
in the now bright sunshine for several minutes
more ; and it was not for several minutes after it
had ceased for the second time, that I ventured
to plant my camera on the lip of the crater, to
get a view of the wonderfully beautiful incrusta-
tion with which it is lined (Plate XII.).

It was a frightfully hot day. About lunch
time, whilst changing plates on the top of the
steps as usual, and still suffering from a difference
between the size of my dark slides and the plates,
I heard thunder, rapidly growing louder with every
peal. The " Little Fountain " was to play again
about two o'clock, and the spectacle was rendered

II

w '*
£.2.

y 0

IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA 57

finer than ever on the sunny side, by the contrast of
the brilliantly illuminated drops with the inky sky
behind them. Viewed from the other side of its
large basin, by stooping down until one could see
the sun through the spray, a very curious effect is
produced by the shadows of the larger drops cast
upon the steamy mist, and thus made visible in
long, thin lines. These seem to radiate from the
sun, and as the drops are falling, and their shadows
lengthen as they get further from the centre, they
produce an effect very much like a kind of
catherine-wheel, with the sun in the middle. I
do not remember ever reading of this, and it may
be that no one has happened to notice it. Of
course it is most easily observed when the sun is
low.

After some very fine multiple flashes of light-
ning, all at a considerable distance, the storm
passed away, and under a glare almost painful we
strolled about looking at various pools and forma-
tions on the Fountain terrace. We were specially
pleased with a large shallow pool, full of a sea-
weed-like growth, which stopped short at the
surface of the water, so that the whole had the
look of some marvellously handsome, highly
polished section of an enormous tree-stump.
The colours of this pool ran through all shades of
amber to bright golden yellow, and so through
rich siennas to the umbers, from the lightest to
the darkest ; whilst the glassy surface of the
water, itself so still and spotless as to be invisible
even on close inspection, reflected the azure of
the sky, giving an indescribable softness to the
blending tints. There were some very curious

4

58 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

spiders about, the size of our large garden variety,
which moved very rapidly by leaping on the
surface of the warm water. Their colour was
blue-grey, they were hairless, and their legs
rather long. They seemed to take a fancy to
our boots, and, if the truth be told, they jumped
so long and fast, that we had some difficulty, on
this treacherous ground of pools and streams, in
keeping them at a respectful distance.

Crossing the waggon trail above the terraces,
we came to the mud volcanoes. They are well
described in the books, and one need not say
more than that the colour of the crater wall is
a yellowish white, the thin, boiling mud inside
being a pure light grey. These I photographed
carefully (vide Plate XIII., which gives a general
view of one of the mud volcanoes, which are
called the Mammoth Paint-pots; and Plate XIV.,
which is an instantaneous photograph of a large
bubble of mud blown by the steam, and taken in
the very act of bursting).

In the evening some niggers amused us with
songs, accompanied by banjo and mandolin, and
some very clever step-dancing. " Way down
upon the Swanee River " is sung very slowly,
and as a pathetic song — not at all as I have
often heard it " rendered " in England.

Before dinner, we went into the wood at the
back of the hotel to see, if we possibly could,
something more of the wild bears, and to try to
get some photographs of them. After sitting
quietly for an hour under the trees on the edge
of the wood, I suddenly heard twigs cracking,
and the sound of some heavy animal moving

fjm |

I

IMPRESSION'S OF AMKRICA

quickly close behind us. Standing up and looking
round, I saw, through the tree trunks, a great
big black bear coming straight towards us. At
the same time he spied me, and instantly changed
his course, crashing away back into the wood.
We had all but given up hopes of seeing any
more of them, when, behind a thin line of trees
between us and some white geyserite, the same
black bear reappeared, walking leisurely down
(vide Plate XV.) to the refuse heap mentioned
before. I secured two pictures of him before he
spied us again and retreated, stopping every now
and then and gazing hard in our direction. Just
then the scrap cart came into view, with a pair
of horses, and soon afterwards we again sighted
our bear behind us in the wood ; at least, we
could see his head just over the undergrowth,
eyeing us and the cart alternately. Then he
moved slowly to the left, and made two or three
visits to the food heap, evidently very shy, for he
seized a piece or two, and hurriedly retreated to
a retired spot to enjoy it, coming back again for
more, two or three times.

Presently there came from the same part of
the wood a very large she-bear, also black, and a
fine cub ; and then two other black bears. The
mother clearly ruled the roast, and when either
of the other two tried to get something to eat, she
growled savagely, and half turning towards them,
drove them from the tempting heap. After
seeing that the cub was choosing morsels suitable
to its years, she ceased eating, and gazed long
and anxiously towards the spectators, of whom
by this time there were a considerable number,

64 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

and at last retreated, driving her cub before her,
evidently uneasy about it. Eventually she drove
it up a tree, where it remained so long as we were
there, whilst she herself went back to feed, the
two other black bears prowling round, but not
daring to eat so long as the she-bear was at table.
I photographed the mother and cub as they were
crossing the geyserite, alarmed chiefly, I believe,
by the stand camera and its black cloth. We
heard that later a large cinnamon-bear, of whom
all the others stand in awe, came down from the
woods to the feast, but we did not see him, and
by that time it was too dark to make any more
photography possible.

Next day we made a very early start — it is
always cold here in the early mornings, and a
great coat is a welcome addition to one's clothing.
On the drive to the Upper Basin we saw a timber
wolf which crossed the trail. He stayed a
moment or two in the wood there, and then re-
crossed, gazing at us wistfully before vanishing
again, They are very fierce beasts, harmless by
day, and never attacking man singly. But at
night, and when they have the courage numbers
give, a man could not meet with a much more
unpleasant foe. They leap at him, snapping at
each bound, and biting out, cleanly, a mouthful
at each snap. We also saw a large fox with a
splendid brush, darker in colour than our English
breed, larger, too, and stronger looking. As we
passed through the Upper Basin, none of the
geysers were playing, but the whole plain was
steaming, and looked most extraordinary. Soon
after losing sight of this wonderful tract, we

SI

IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA 67

turned out of the main trail for some distance,
to visit the " Lone Star " geyser, which kindly
treated us to a fine eruption (vide Plates XVI.
and XVI I.). I hope my photograph of the cone of
this geyser will give some idea of its great beauty.
We crossed the divide, and on this part of the
drive I noticed first how the cracks on the pine
trunks are almost all spiral ; and not only so,
but almost invariably go from left to right,
beginning from the root end, thus : —

I asked the driver if he could explain this, but
he only told me that he had often heard it
debated, and that it was supposed to be due
to the vibration of the tree under the prevailing
wind. This does not seem to me to explain the
direction of the screw at all, for if a wind blows

68 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

on a tree it does not appear more likely to make
a screw in one direction than in the other. Now
and then I noticed a screw from right to left, but
not more than six cases to over a hundred of the
other. At first, I thought it might be due to the
unequal heating of the trunks by the sun, and
perhaps it is really caused by this ; and yet the
sun scarcely reaches many of the trees in the
wood, and it is difficult to see, if this is the cause,
why there should be any exceptions, as the sun
always heats the southern side most, and,
moreover, always goes from east to west. I
notice, too, that the cracks roughly form the
boundaries of the continuations of each main
root trunk up the body of the tree, so that the
pine resembles a cord, the strands of which are
twisted in a screw of very high pitch. This must
evidently give wonderful play to the tree under
any twisting forces, and make it able to bear the
asymmetric heat of the sun — and consequent
asymmetric expansion -- without splitting, for
every strand at some point of its course comes
to the sunny side, so that the effect of the sun-
shine is to make all the strands longer, and hence
to make the tree taller on every side. Conversely,
in winter time, contraction must knit the strands
tightly together, and thus, probably, this spiral
arrangement acts as a protection to the tree from
the effects of both heat and cold, as well as of the
wind. Now the effect of any force in nature is
very often, though not always, such as to make
the effect of a second application of the same
force less than the effect of the first. For
example, if a soft mass of clay is compressed in a

o

IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA 73

mould by a series of equal blows from a hammer,
the very compression produced by the first blow
will make the clay more able to resist the second,
and so on, until finally the blows produce no
further effect. It follows, therefore, that where a
system has taken a form by which it is able to
resist certain forces, it is at least not unlikely that
those very forces have caused the arrangement.

Hence we may reasonably suppose that it is
heat and possibly prevalent wind pressure which
have caused this spiral arrangement, and further
that the prevailing direction of the screw (right-
handed as seen from the root looking up the axis
of the tree) is due to some cause which affects all
the trees alike — such as the rotation of the earth
from west to east — and the fact that the trees I
have examined are all in the Northern hemisphere.
If this is the case, then most trees should have a
left-handed screw in the Southern hemisphere.1
The few cases of left-handed screw observed, may
very well be due to these trees being shaded by
others or by rocks, &c., on their south side, and
open to the reflected heat of the sun on their
northern sides. As far as a hasty glance at the
surroundings of two of these left-handed ones
could tell, this hypothesis seems to tally fairly
well with facts. But to explain the exact way in
which the spiral is formed, even if one's conjecture
as to the cause is correct, is not at all easy. The
effect of heat in expanding the wood may be quite
negligible in comparison with its drying effect,
which would give, on the whole, a contraction ;

1 The writer has not yet been able to get any information
on this point.

74 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

as the sun shines first on the east side of the
trunk, and then on the south, and finally on the
west, it might be supposed that the spiral would
follow the course of the sun, but this is precisely
what it does not generally do.

I observed many hundreds of trees for the
direction of their twist, before leaving America,
both in Yellowstone Park, in California, in
Colorado, and in the neighbourhood of New
York, and though I find a very decided
majority of what I call right-handed trees, like
those here mentioned, yet in some places, notably
on the way to Seven Lakes, above Loch Marie,
in the Pikes Peak district, I came across large
groups of left-handed specimens — and that too in
all sorts of positions with respect to the slopes
they grew on and their orientation. So that I
cannot offer any explanation. These curious
twists extend to the whole "grain " of the wood,
and are important — since it is only those trees
whose wood is free from twist which supply good
timber ; and I was told by more than one back-
woodsman, that the very first thing a woodcutter
does when he wishes to fell a tree for timber, is to
remove a piece of the bark and inspect the surface
beneath for twist. If the cause of this spiral
arrangement were therefore understood, it is
likely that some treatment might be devised
whereby its development might be prevented,
or at least greatly reduced. I am personally
inclined to believe that it must have its origin in
the structure of the seed,- and so perhaps be
transmitted by a tree to its offspring. This
would perhaps account for trees of similar twist
so often occurring in groups.

CHAPTER III

FTER leaving the "Lone Star"
geyser, we drove up a lovely
canon — Gibbon's, I think — and
at its head saw for a few minutes
the grand Teton Range (14,400
feet), rising pale grey, but sharply
defined, 75 miles away. Crossing the watershed
again, we looked down for the first time on the
broad and lovely Yellowstone Lake. Its waters
were a light cobalt blue, backed by the picturesque,
dusky red range of Absaroka Mountains, fully
thirty miles off, one of the four great natural
barriers of the " Park." Pine forests slope down
to the yellow strand on every side. A patch or
two of snow lay blue in the faint haze on the
upper slopes of the distant hills, and scarcely
darker gleamed tracts of geyserite at their feet
Through the tree-tops belows us could be seen
white canvas tents, and at a jetty, thrust out but
a few feet into the water, lay a small steamer, the
first (though I fear not the last) to float on these
far-away, secluded waters.

75

76 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

Lunch was served in one of the tents, and after
visiting the mud volcanoes, and the hot springs of
soft water which lie on the very margin of the
lake, some of them indeed in it, we went aboard,
leaving our driver to take the longer road to the
hotel at the south end of the water. The sun was
broiling hot, and the awning on the boat most
welcome. Rapidly the tents and trees, the beach
and pools, receded from us as we sped over this
wonderful lake, 8,000 feet above the sea. If you
look down into its water, it is the colour of
summer fields of grass, and crowded with small,
yellowish-green, gelatinous particles, which the
captain said he believed were the pollen or seed
of some water plant. These only appear in
August, and are declared — according to the
captain — by two well-known Professors, to be
the pollen of the pines, which has been blown
into the lake. I suppose the Professors did not
give their opinion without duly examining the
"pollen" microscopically, and if its identity with
the pine product has been proved this way, no
more remains to be said. Still the captain
remains a sceptic. Whatever these little par-
ticles may be, there is an astonishing number
of them, for they seem to fill the whole lake, so
far as we could see ; and I could not make out
that they were any more numerous near the south
shore and its pine forests, than further out —
perhaps because a moderate south wind was
blowing whilst we crossed.

Yellowstone Lake possesses many attractions,
not only lovely fjord-like arms, running far up
towards the mountains, but several wooded islets,

IMl'RKSSIOXS OK AMERICA 77

on one of which we landed. Before getting
ashore, we could see an antelope walking along
quietly by the water's edge, inspecting us — it
seemed almost tame, though it was in a perfectly
natural and wild condition, and had never been
in captivity. When we landed, it retreated
several yards, but then came slowly back, and
allowed its nose to be stroked, but not its back ;
at any attempt to do this, it showed a strong
inclination, first to butt and kick, and then to run
away altogether. There are wild elk and buffalo ;
one of the latter — a huge old bull — lives in the
same island. I got a photograph of him, and of
one of the antelopes, through a wooden palisade
put up to prevent mischief, if visitors prove
unwelcome to these powerful creatures. As it
was, the bull was in by no means a pleasant
mood, and at the very moment at which my
photograph was taken, he was meditating a
charge, I believe, at some of the other visitors,
Such splendid specimens are getting rare now,
yet not so very many years ago the plains about
here used to quake under the steps of tens of
thousands of them, as they swept by in vast
herds before the huntsman or the prairie fire.
Hardly had we left the shore before we spied
two large white birds sitting on the water some
distance ahead ; at first I thought they were
geese or swans, then their heads came into
profile with their enormous beaks, and left no
doubt as to their kind. They were pelicans,
fishing for the trout with which these waters
literally swarm. Fishermen are never disap
pointed with Yellowstone Lake, and in one place

78 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

a spring of boiling water, the crater round which
actually rises from the marginal water of the lake,
makes it possible and easy to cook your fish as
soon as you have caught him. The pelicans rose
from the lake as the steamer approached, and
with lazy flappings flew off to a number of their
kind which we could see standing idle, or fishing,
or eyeing the water, or resting uncouthly in the
sun, on the sandy shore of a promontory some
six hundred yards away.

Shortly after four o'clock we landed, and went
exploring along the lake shore, picking up some
interesting -looking pebbles, and gathering un-
familiar flowers in the meadows hard by. There
are many bears here too, which are fed as at the
Fountain Hotel, but after dinner we had other
things to do, and did not go out to see them.
Two sturdy cubs lie in the back yard, tethered to
poles. They drink and bathe in sunken water-
buckets, and share one kennel. I heard that a
lady, who, I suppose, over-estimated her courage,
went up to play with one of these little creatures,
and when the cub came running straight towards
her, in sudden fear she backed into the bears'
tub, at least half full of water, and that, too, not
particularly clean ! I saw one of the cubs sitting
in the tub, with its head just resting contentedly
on the edge, an inch above the ground. It
looked the very spirit of mischief.

On Thursday morning we made our start for
the Grand Canon. The road leads through pine
forests the first part of the way, without any
specially interesting object, until after passing a
hot spring on the left (which used, so they say,

IMPRESSION'S OF AMERICA Hi

to be a mud geyser), the mud volcano is reached
on the same side. It is a place which would be
horrible to any one the least superstitious, and to
the most matter-of-fact person, the thought of the
fate which would befall him should a false step or
treacherous ground cast him into the crater, must
greatly strengthen the impression the funereal
colouring of the pit cannot fail to make. It lies
on the side of the hill, the ground having fallen
in to a depth of forty or fifty feet. In the lowest
part of that side of the crater which is most
deeply cut into the hill is a very dark cave ;
the floor of this is of boiling mud (vide Plate
XVIII.), the consistency of rather thick mortar.
Every few seconds this heaves up into a large
convex kind of bubble, which the imprisoned steam
blows to pieces with a muffled explosion. The
mud is projected more or less violently forwards,
part on to the opposite side of the crater, which
is thus kept moist and sticky, while part falls
with a sloshy noise into the mud coils which form
the level floor. Every eight or ten minutes this
monster has paroxysms, when its dull thunder
may be heard for a quarter of a mile, and ground
shakes all round its mouth. It is condemned to
swallow its own mud, until the restless Fire Spirit
below grows cold, and the volcano's throat is
choked by the solidification of what it has ejected.
A short distance away is a spring, which repeats
exactly the action of the mud volcano, only in
this case what is thrown out is not mud but
water, and this little water volcano is on a very
much smaller scale.

Before reaching the canon, the road runs

82 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

between low, rounded hills, almost devoid of
trees, formed of clay, with water-worn stones,
and occasionally carved into well-defined terraces.
The placid river shows no sign of what is
coming, until just before you enter the rather
insignificant gorge, which is really the beginning
of the canon. There its waters suddenly break
into rapids. Between the pines you look down
on large rocks lying in lines across the river bed,
with the stream flowing fast between them.
Then comes more foam, and then a ledge of
water, over which the river seems to disappear
into space (vide Plate XIX., which shows the
corresponding ledge of water seen from the
approach to the Lower Fall), for the eye catches
sight of nothing beyond but a comparatively
distant fir- and pine-clad cliff. The roar of the
Upper Fall — which lies here — breaks on the ear,
and a minute later, as you pass over a trestle
bridge above a graceful cascade made by one of
the Yellowstone's small tributaries, a first view of
the upper part of the marvellous canon greets
you ; enough is seen to arouse keen expectation,
and then it is practically hidden by the thickly
clustered pines, and so to the hotel.

Directly after lunch we walked down to Look-
Out Point, and though the view from this
favourite spot is not so comprehensive as that
from Inspiration Point, or from some of the
others near, it is a great deal more than the
mind can grasp, even after prolonged gazing and
mental measurement of heights and distances.
Far below where we stand, five young eagles
are sitting in their nest which crowns a vertical

o

IMPRESSION'S OF AMERICA 87

pillar of rock, part of a ridge several hundreds of
feet high — one of the many buttresses which
support the tremendous thrust the walls of this
wonderful gulf must exert. One of the parent
birds is flying in great circles in the canon air,
so clear that it makes it impossible to judge
accurately of the distance of those seamed
mountain walls which tower up to our own
Jevel just opposite. The white head and dark-
brown back of the other bird are to be seen
almost vertically under our look-out point, where
it sits, still as a statue, on the top of a tall bare
pine trunk, foreshortened so, that — but for the
length of its shadow — it might rise only a few
feet above the soil. The eagle is watching
intently the deep blue waters of the Yellowstone
River, as they flow with a sullen, distant roar
over the rocks which have fallen to the lowest
depths. On the right, embedded in the very
heart of the shadows into which the sun — already
sinking — throws these giant cliffs and pinnacles,
lies the Lower Fall (Plate XX.), in reality a
broad white pyramid of foam near four hundred
feet high, but dwarfed and coloured by distance
to a dash of faint blue, below a finest line of
twinkling gold, in sombre azure setting.

On the left, in a glare such as you must see to
believe, with the sunshine falling full on them,
rise Titanic walls, parapets, turreted castles,
spires, and towers — their foundations in the
shadows now creeping along the river and up
the sides, while their upper steeps are all of
glowing yellow and dazzling white, with here and
there a sweep of palest apple-green. Half-way

88 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

down their hues deepen into orange, red, and the
crimson of blood ; whilst in places groups of pines
— looking little higher than bushes — relieve and
intensify, with their dark foliage, the weird tints
of their mother soil.

Slowly the evening shadows climb the radiant
wall, as they have done for countless years past;
the eagles gather to their nests, whilst, as the
twilight deepens, bears, woodchucks, ground hogs,
and other beasts of prey, prowl amongst the trees
on the crumbling slopes as of old ; and all night
long the rocks reverberate the ceaseless, ancient
voice of troubled waters, ever lengthening and
deepening their age-long work. Few are the
scenes which last in memory, even through our
brief span of life, but I think the Yellowstone
Canon is one, — so savage and unearthly in its
colouring, so gigantic in its proportions, so utterly
indifferent to, and independent of, man. (Plate
XXI. The canon from the brink of the Lower
Fall — looking down the valley.)

That night we felt thankful that we had set
aside a spare day to be devoted to the canon ;
and by next evening still more so, after viewing
the Lower Fall from its brink (Plate XXII.), and
from a rock about a third of the way down the
side of the canon, to say nothing of the grand
drive to Inspiration Point.

On the drive from the canon to Mammoth Hot
Springs, although the scenery is pretty and in-
teresting almost all the way, there is not very
much to record. Virginia Cascade, a long water
slide in a small canon, looked lovely in the
morning light ; and in the border of the wood

IMTKKSSIONs OF AMKKMCA 93

we spied a black-tailed deer. We spent some
time at the Norris Basin, but the " Monarch "
had played in the night, as the wetness of the
ground all round the geyser showed. The
" Vixen " I watched awhile, her short, spasmodic
outbreaks recurring every fifty seconds. Between
the Norris Basin and Mammoth Springs I photo-
graphed the Beaver Lodge and dams (Plate
XXIII., which shows the dams running right
across the northern end of the Lake), in this
case made of mud and grass firmly plastered
down ; and, on reaching the Mammoth Hotel,
spent several plates on Pulpit (Plate XXIV.)
and Minerva Terraces (Plates XXV. and
XXVI.). The light was bad for the latter,
and I fear, in spite of the yellow screens,
there will be a sad lack of contrast in the
pictures.

We both admired the terraces on this second
inspection much more than at first, and thought
that our guide had missed conducting us to the
most beautiful parts of the formation when first
we visited them.

After, a great hurry-scurry of packing, and a
desperate attempt to get some food, we ascended
the coach steps, and in two hours, in the dusk,
reached Cinnabar. There the Y. P. Transport
Co. hurled our baggage out on to the far end of
the platform, whilst the railway officials refused to
move it nearer the office, as they said it was not
their business ; however, after a few remarks on
both sides, and some kind help from an indignant
American fellow-passenger, I got it checked just
as our train for the West was moving off, and

5

94 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

once again we settled down to the comparative
quiet of the train for four days.

The first part of the way lay through wild and
sometimes beautiful country, almost uninhabited,
the hills for the most part being bare, and not
very high. Often we skirted the sandy shores of
a large river, edged with brushwood and stunted
firs ; but before Portland, where the weather was
very hot, we began to enter the magnificent
forests of the West. At Hope's Fork, where our
river joined the Columbia, the scenery was ex-
quisite, and the lake one placid sheet of gold
under a wonderful sunset sky.

Early next morning the train ran on to a ferry,
and we crossed the Columbia in the same way as
we had previously crossed the Mississippi, on the
wide ferry-boat. The Shasta route proved rather
disappointing on account of the forest fires, which
had engendered such vast volumes of smoke that
for miles the view had no distance in it, and the
sun only just showed through as a deep blood-
coloured disc. It was very hot too ; even in the
observation car, which is open on both sides, a
dry, hot wind blew. Evening overtook us as we
were slipping down a deep wooded valley, along-
side a brawling mountain stream, fed partly by
the medicinal springs of Shasta ; and on each side
a thick growth of huge pines, firs, and underwood,
including bushes red with gooseberries, the little
branches quite borne down with ripe fruit, all the
more tempting because we could not get at them,
and, I am bound to add, from the fact that all the
food provided on the train was execrably mouldy.

On Wednesday morning, under a gloomy sky

IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA 99

and a cold breeze, I had my first glimpse of the
Pacific ; not, indeed, of the open ocean, but of
the long, almost land-locked, bay of San Francisco,
whose entrance is the world-famed "Golden Gate."
The water here was brown, streaked with yel-
lowish-green, and small leaden breakers curled in
on the wide and flat mud shore. The train
rapidly rounded one little headland after another,
the sea becoming greener and then more blue, till
Oakland, from the railway a most uninteresting-
looking manufacturing town, broke upon us.

In the station we got out, walked by a broad,
covered way on to the large steamboat ferry, and
for a quarter of an hour were crossing the green
waters of the Bay to 'Frisco itself. We felt the
change of temperature keenly after our late broiling
suns ; and though, I expect, the thermometer was
not below 50° F., it seemed like winter. Every
one was warmly dressed.

San Francisco struck me at once as a fine
city. It lies at the bottom and all up one side
of a rather steep hill, and the wide, white streets,
running as straight as lines can up this hill, give
it a curiously streaked look when seen from the
sea. It is far more countrified than New York
or Chicago, and the cobbles in the streets are the
worst I have seen in any town or village. Driving
is made still worse by the level square crossings
of the car lines, but the streets themselves are
very wide, airy, and spotlessly clean, and the
buildings fine and tall. The traffic produced no
inconvenient crowding either, nor did the people
seem particularly intent on any business.

They say this city is always cool, and that this

ioo IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

is caused by a cold current which hugs the coast
all the way down from Alaska. Perhaps this is
part of the warm Japan current which has become
cooled far up in the North, and which, after re-
turning South, down these far Western coasts, is
drifted by winds to the West, again joining the
Black Current of Japan (Karo Sivo), and so
completing a vast circulation of water akin to the
Gulf Stream. We bumped along to the Palace
Hotel, a very fine building and very large. H.
set to work to rearrange luggage, whilst I paid
visits to ticket-offices, bank, and Kahn's, a photo-
grapher, where I gave an order for four dozen of
Seed's well-known plates to replenish my fast
diminishing store. This done, we took the car
to the Park and Cliff House. The former is very
beautifully laid out in wide gravel drives, with
noble borders, planted with all kinds of shrubs,
trees and flowers. Many of them reminded us of
home as we walked along, but, pressed for time,
we could not stay long, and reserved a closer
inspection for our second visit, which was duly
paid some days later, when we visited the aviaries,
by far the best I know of, and some of the animal
houses.

Cliff House looks out over the Pacific ; the
breakers were rolling in grandly on the sandy
beach, throwing up clouds of spray near the seal
rocks. These last are a few mewstones, and
their ledges are thickly covered with large brown
seals, most lying lazily, but one or two with their
heads raised high in the air, sometimes waving
them from side to side like captive polar bears.
After dinner, at which an orchestra played, we

IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA 105

returned to 'Frisco by the electric car, with its
clever overhead wire and fishing-rod contact
maker, and leaving the heavy luggage behind,
crossed the water to Oakland, and there took the
cars for Yosemite.

By break of day we were at Raymond, a small
country station, with an inn opposite. Thence
we started, when we had had breakfast, in a
covered little " Surrey " for Wawona, which we
reached after an exhausting and dusty drive of
forty-four miles, uphill almost all the way. In
the first ten miles or so, we saw bluebirds, mag-
pies, scores of squirrels and " chipmunks " (as
they pronounce them), some very tiny birds — the
smallest I have ever seen — a kind of wren ; red-
crested woodpeckers too, which make holes in the
trees and fill them with acorns, one to each hole :
the grubs come from the trees into the acorns,
the industrious pecker visits the holes from time
to time, and when the acorn is inhabited picks
out the worm and eats it. We saw one bird
flying with the acorn in its mouth, and many of
the holes already filled. Very long-eared hares
and rabbits we also met with, and renewed our
acquaintance with the ground chuck.

The country, so far, was a series of gently
rounded low hills, covered with a shallow soil
from decomposed granite, on which grew
hundreds of ilex and oak trees, with thin grass
and many flowers between them. Michaelmas
daisies and sunflowers were the commonest.
Next, came higher hills with many gold mines,
some now unused but most in full work, with
clusters of log-huts and rather pretty-looking

io6 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

lodges near them. Grub Gulch is the largest we
passed. After lunch at a most charming country
inn, and a change of horses, we began a seem-
ingly never-ending hill ; and about three o'clock
struck timber, not to leave it during our whole
stay in Yosemite. Of all the many wonderful
and beautiful things this tour has already shown
us, perhaps none will live more vividly in
memory than these aged pine forests, which
dwarf the road to a mere pony path, and often
rise with never a bough or leaf for a hundred and
fifty feet on both sides of the way, like the pillars
of some vast cathedral, and then break into
graceful foliage almost meeting overhead. Thus
we could drive in deep cool shade on the hottest
days. Morning and evening, shafts of light
penetrate the lattice of the leaves in places,
picking out, here the lovely fronds of some young
silver pine, there the graceful fringes of a cedar.
The many different species prevent any feeling
of weariness : perhaps the sugar pine is the
finest of all, with its dark tufts and its huge
cones ; but it is very difficult to decide. Anything
more exquisite than some of the young cedars I
never saw ; and even after driving hour after hour
through the woods we still gazed untired, and
could not repress exclamations of wonder and
delight, as bends in the winding road showed ever
new vistas of beauty. Of the road itself—
especially of the descent to Wawona — the less
said the better. One of the awning supports, a
piece of very fair cast-iron more than a quarter of
an inch thick, broke off short from the jolting, and
I fancy that if we had either of us been weak, we

OF AMERICA 107

should have experienced what our American
cousins call " car sickness." We executed every
kind of known motion, short of spinning round,
and wondered at the strength of the lightly built
wheels, which had, however, as many as twenty
spokes each ; and so, just before sunset, we rattled
down the last sandy slope, and found ourselves
among the fountains and gardens of sunny
Wawona. That evening, in a cellar, I changed
my plates and arranged with the kind and
genial host how we had best spend our time in
Yosemite.

CHAPTER IV

EXT morning early we started
again, this time in an open
" Surrey," for the twenty-seven
miles drive to Sentinel Hotel,
which lies in the heart of Yose-
mite Valley : we chose an open
" Surrey," as it is really important, on this road, to
be able to see uninterruptedly what lies above, as
well as in front and on both sides of the carriage.
The trail lies along the sides of the Sierras'
outliers, and until Inspiration Point is reached
the views may all be described in one word-
trees. The rich brown pine trunks in the fore-
ground frame the pictures, the bark of some of
them golden yellow with lichen : there are trees
in mid-distance, countless spires of green and
silver; trees far away, hills and mountains of
them, all detail lost in the blue of the air and the
haze of the forest fires, so that only the fine
serrated sky-line betrays that they are there. In
places the hill-sides are covered with fallen giants,
the trunks crossing each other at every conceiv-

108

1

IMPRESSIONS OF AMKKICA in

able angle, most of them stripped bare of bark.
The cold greys of these withered glories of the
forest make the foliage of the rising generation
glow all the more brightly. The wheels squeak
and groan under the heavy brake, as we descend
some steep slope where the road is broken into
holes, not to mention ruts a foot deep, and large
stones concealed by the orange dust. Deep glades
open at every turn — banks of the coolest shade—
and out of the ground, overstrewn with slippery
pine needles and clusters of cones, arise the
blackened stumps of the victims of forest fires,
taking the shape of long-eared rabbit or begging
bear, objects quite startling in the gloom.

But the gorge below us is becoming steeper and
grander, the trees along the edge of the road less
and less thickly clustered, and presently, as the
driver pulls up on a little knoll of rock and grass,
the glorious Yosemite lies spread out before us
(Plate XXVII.). We are scarcely in the valley
itself, so that distance softens the whole view, blend-
ing into one harmony of colour the stark pinnacles
and precipices, the bleak far-off peaks, the gleaming
streak of waterfall, and the cool, broad forests,
deep in which the mountains on either side bury
their feet. In one glance at such a sight the
discoverers must have forgotten all their toil ; and
as a man gazes on this valley, so old and yet
ever young — on its walls, scarred and lined where
the ages have written its history in yet almost
unknown characters and language — on its forests,
descendants through generations of centuries of
those on which the towers and cliffs first looked
down, he seems to see before him the long-lost

H2 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

Garden of Eden, and to hear the echoes still
lingering over those ever thrilling words : " God
saw everything that He had made, and behold it
was very good."

To me this particular view of Yosemite re-
called the Norwegian Naerodal (vide Plate
XXVIII.); that far-famed valley is the only
one I have seen which will at all bear com-
parison with it, and though there certainly is a
likeness, and that too in more points than one,
the two are so far different in general character,
that to see one would not make it possible to
picture the other. In both, the ice of now
perished glaciers has given to mountain-tops a
regular dome-like form; perhaps the "Jordal-
snut " takes the palm for perfection of geometrical
shape, its graceful curve from head to foot
making it impossible to say with certainty where
the curve of the dome itself begins or where it
ends, and whereas it is of pale violet Labradorite,
the domes of the Yosemite are of a light yellow
granite. The actual depth of both valleys is
about the same, but the Naerodal is much
narrower, and this makes the valley, as seen from
Stalheim, look much deeper than the Yosemite
viewed from Inspiration Point. In both the walls
are of almost completely bare rock.

El Capitan is represented in the Naerodal by
the tremendous precipice on the right of the
dale, the Kaldafjeld ; but this latter is not so
clean cut, so frowning, nor so perpendicular as
the gigantic cliff which guards the left of the
entrance to the Californian valley. El Capitan,
in fact, is in places more than perpendicular, — it

7

IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA 1.5

overhangs. Then again, the Norwegian valley is
but seven or eight miles long, whereas Yosemite is
over seventeen ; but whereas the American dale
ends in a cul-de-sac of very distant lofty jagged
peaks, the wondrous half-dome cutting the
eastern sky just to the left of them, its form
completed in the North dome to the left again,
the Norwegian dale becomes a magnificent fjord,
the line of precipices, as seen from Stalheim,
turning a corner behind which they are lost to
view.

Strangely enough both valleys boast four
waterfalls, and in both, from the finest point of
view, but one can be seen. In the Norwegian it
lies in the distance, just over where the fjord
begins, a thin white streak. On the other hand,
the fall in Yosemite, visible from this point, is a
strikingly beautiful feature of the view. On the
right, and fairly near, this " Bridal Veil," as it is
called, descends in a graceful line of sparkling
foam, all but a thousand feet sheer. It is set in
dark bare rock, and in the cloud of spray which
borders the veil, the afternoon sun kindles a maze
of rainbow colours. Perhaps this fall is most
beautiful in the dry season, when the wind is
playing with it, waving it from side to side, now
spreading it out like a many-rayed fan, now holding
it up suspended altogether in the air for a
moment, only to let it loose again in one long fall
of exquisitely pointed lace work.

On the opposite side of the valley, and further
off, is the second cataract, of a different character
altogether. Down the central line of a wild
gorge, cut wide and deep into the main wall of

n6 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

granite, which here is at least three thousand
feet from base to summit, leaps the Yosemite
river in two great bounds, from where the
deep blue sky shows over the scarred edge, to
the slope of debris with which frost, wind, and
rain have hidden the lowest part of the cliff.
Between the falls lies a large pool of water in
a hollow to which the curious may descend by
a zigzag path, and from which the finest view
of the upper cascade is to be had.

A grand sight it must be when the river is
full, and all the valley resounds with the din of
the heavy waters. In a storm, when the wind
rages up the gorge in mighty gusts, it sometimes
holds up in the air, for a second or two, even this
great torrent ; and then, men say that above the
roar of the tempest, and the hissing of the pines
bowing before the blasts, can be heard the thunder
of the pent-up waters as they tear asunder the
air, and, gathering might in their descent, furiously
hurl themselves into the dark caldron. How
different the tiny thread of silver, slowly
threading its way amongst piled-up rocks blazing
in the hot sun ; and the gentle murmuring of the
little stream, gliding over the rounded stones,
playing hide-and-seek amongst the boulders, until
it flows noiselessly into the river Merced meander-
ing through the meadows and woods which cover
the floor of the great valley. So it was when I
saw it : but the water-marks on the side of the
grim precipice, and the wide bed of the stream,
tell their own tale ; and even if there had been
no photographs to help, it would not have been
difficult to picture what this fall is in its strength.

IMPRESSION'S OF AMKRICA 117

The other two waterfalls, the Nevada and the
Vernal, are also invisible from Inspiration Point —
hidden by projections from the right side of the
dale ; they, too, are fine sights, and we explored
them thoroughly later. And so we take leave of
this first view of Yosemite, and again drive on
down the increasingly steep road, craning our
necks first to the left to El Capitan, and then to
the right, where the Cathedral rocks and towers
rise in red pinnacles and battlements till their
topmost crags are almost vertically overhead.

Once arrived in the valley, the photographer is
indeed hard put to it. Everything is so enormous,
so hopelessly out of reach of any ordinary wide-
angle lens, that time after time he gives up in
despair the attempt to get a picture of scenery he
longs to show to folks at home. The twin
Cathedral spires, indeed, I took, with the ground
glass anything but vertical, and I also got a view
of El Capitan, rising like a rampart of heaven,
dim and distant behind the pines ; but the photo-
graph, alas Y will not give its colour, the palest of
yellow greys, nor the silver radiance of the edge
glistening in the sunshine.

About five o'clock we reached the Sentinel
Hotel ; and in a few minutes were driving
towards the upper end of the valley, to get a
general idea of the He of the two minor valleys
which run into the main, one on the right, and
one on the left. We passed the spot where once
stood another hotel, now burnt down, and, from
just by the site, I took a photograph of the left
valley, with the Dome on one side, and Mount
Watkin (named after one of the most celebrated

n8 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

of early American photographers) in the centre ;
on the other side, but not included in the picture,
rises Cloud's Rest and the Half Dome. At the
foot of the latter, hidden by trees, nestles Mirror
Lake. The view all round from this spot is
magnificent. Turning further to the right, the
Cap of Liberty imitates, on a smaller scale, the
precipices of the Half Dome ; then follows the
Nevada Fall ; then the stupendous face of Glacier
Point ; and, with the Royal Arches, which are
enormous curved recesses in a naked, unbroken
precipice of nearly 3,000 feet, we come round to
the South Dome again.

By this time the sun is low in the west, all
the cliffs on one side lie in shade, yet not dark,
for the golden glow on their rivals opposite lights
them up awhile with a strange and wonderful
orange light — but the army of shadows is scaling
the heights, gaining one summit after another,
till the last crimson flush fades from Half Dome
and Cloud's Rest. The arch of night steals
quickly up the eastern sky, soon it is overhead,
then far down in the west where a bar of amber
light is all that is left to tell of another bright day
gone. Happy Island we did not visit — just now
Miserable Isle would be a more fitting name, for
a sudden fall of hundreds of tons of rock from the
top of the precipice over it has buried its trees
and ferns and flowers in dust seven inches deep ;
so we drove to the foot of the Yosemite fall, and
then made for our hotel, charmingly placed on
the very bank of the river, into whose cool, clear
waters we look down from the balcony outside our
rooms.

IMPKKSSIOXS OK AMKRICA in;

Rising betimes at seven o'clock, we drove
rapidly in the chilly morning air along the sandy
roads to the foot of the Cloud's Rest trail, which
begins near the once Happy Garden, and becomes
steep directly. The guide rides a horse, H. a black
mule, and I a bay, whilst a white specimen of the
same obstinate species carries our lunch and the
camera. The guide goes first leading the pack
mule, which needs constant attention ; then
follows H., whilst I bring up the rear. Switches
are necessary for all. The trail is a very dusty
path, but never less than a yard and generally a
good six feet wide, and in Norway would be
called a carriage road ; it winds upwards in bold
zig-zags, and first gives beautiful views of the
Vernal, then of the Nevada falls. Perhaps the
outlook is finest just as you climb the side of the
latter. The valley is seen framed on the right
by the smooth precipices of the Cap of Liberty,
which run down in very massive folds of granite
and disappear into the pine-tops far below ; and on
the left, by the dashing water of the fall itself.

At the top of the Nevada we dismounted to
rest the mules, and to look at the fall from a rock
which juts out a little over it. All about this
spot are huge ice-polished rocks, and perched far
up on the top of a cliff we could just make out
Glacier Point Hotel, where we hoped to sleep
the next night. A dead rattlesnake lay in a
shallow hole in the rocks, and reminded us of
their presence. This is the season when they
are most dangerous, for being sleepy they make
no attempt to get out of your way, and if by
accident you step on one, it strikes at once. I

120

saw a photograph of a man who had been bitten
in the arm not many days ago, taken since then.
He sucked the wound well, and then made for a
camp as fast as he could, hoping to find some
brandy or whiskey. The campers gave him all
they had, but it was not enough, so he ran for
dear life to a second camping-ground ; there too,
though he could not get a really large dose, he
left behind not a drop. Finally, however, he
gained the hotel and its unlimited supplies, and
there drank so much that he nearly died from
alcoholic poisoning. Beyond the fact that the
swelling of the bitten arm has not yet quite
gone down, and that he still is suffering from
headache, he has all but recovered.

Again mounted, for an hour or two we
ascended more zig-zags, the trees growing thinner
and the undergrowth thicker and thicker. From
the final slopes the Half Dome is a superb object,
rising in the most stately way imaginable, like
some huge monolith (Plate XXIX.). From this
side, too, it has lost its dis-symmetry, and seems
perfectly inaccessible. Books, however, tell the
story of the first ascent made by a man x who
constructed a giddy staircase of iron spikes, one
by one, steeple-jack fashion, using the last to
stand on as he drove in the next.

The top of Cloud's Rest, which is nearly 10,000
feet above sea-level, is an almost fiat tableland,
covered with large granite blocks, very like the
summit of Fanaraak, in the Norwegian Jotunheim.
It is interesting to see how the granite weathers
into similar shapes in countries wide apart.

1 George G. Anderson, a Scotchman, of Montrose. This
first ascent was made in October, 1875.

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1MPKKSSIOXS OF AMKRICA

Many of the granite outcrops we have seen in
America are facsimiles of those in the Scilly Isles,
and on the Cornish coast. The profile of the
Hi'4'h Sierra and of the granite mountains near
Livingstone are exactly like those of the Scotch
Isle of Arran, also of granite.

The view from Cloud's Rest is very wonderful,
ami of extraordinary interest to a geologist, as it
shows what land is like when it has only lately
emerged from an ice sheet. Restore the glaciers
which once crawled slowly down the shallow
valleys between the peaks, or lay quietly in the
cirques or "botns," and you have the Norwegian
Jotunfjeld of to-day. No glaciers are visible
from either Cloud's Rest or Glacier Point, yet it
is but a short time, geologically speaking, since
they were there, and it will not be long, in the
same sense, before the rounded granite bosses
are disintegrated into a soil deep enough to
support the stunted vegetation capable of living
at this high altitude.

The camera came into play both for a group of
peaks of the High Sierra, and also for the hazy
Yosemite, still wrapped in drifting smoke of the
forest fires near its entrance — fires, by the way,
which my guide and others attributed to an
incendiary (Plate XXIX.). A cloud, which has
bee;i gradually rising since the early hours of the
morning, now makes it necessary to secure views
quickly, if they are to be taken at all. Lunch
follows, with the sun and wind beating upon us,
and then we turn down the trail through the
rocks, and rejoin the patient mules tethered
below. Then the long descent begins, and it is

6

124 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

dusk when, after twelve hours of fairly hard
work, we regain our hotel.

About eight o'clock next morning we drove to
Mirror Lake to see the sun rise over the Half
Dome, and to enjoy the reflections of mountain,
cliff, and wood in the water, which at this hour is
generally without a ripple. The road runs right
up to and along the western shore, and the most
beautiful view is the first, which greets you quite
unexpectedly. The sun had, of course, long risen
on the surrounding country, only the blue preci-
pices of the Half Dome shroud the little lake in
shadow, so that the reflected picture has plenty of
sunlight in its distances to relieve the deep shades
of the foreground. All is quiet, the birds still
asleep, the mirror so perfect that in the camera
the picture (which, as every one knows, is
inverted) for once seems the right way up. A
foot or two below you lies moist dark-red sand,
then the water, broken by boulders of picturesque
shapes and colours. Here rests a fallen tree,
there a tangle of brushwood, every twig and leaf
pictured below (Plate XXX.). Further away
stretches a wide sheet of light azure crystal ;
already crane are wading in the shallows on the
far shore ; presently, one with lazy flapping flight
makes for some more lonely spot. Now some
wild-duck are taking their morning bath. Over
the mountain on the right the light is brightening :
the sun's rays glisten on the dew which hangs
from leaves low down near the water. A few
minutes pass, and the brilliant edge of the King
of Day rides above the edge of yonder curved
summit, and in an instant all is bathed in glorious

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P "5

IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA 127

light and warmth. It is this sudden change which
makes it so well worth while visiting the lake at
this particular hour, and it must be seen to be
realised.

We drove back past the hotel, and to the foot
of the trail to Glacier Point. No one should
think he knows Yosemite until he has ridden or
walked up at least one of the trails. It is from
these that the valley is seen to the greatest
advantage. Viewed from its floor, the fore-
shortening of the upper part of the cliffs is too
great to be appreciated, and so makes them
appear much lower than they really are ; but from
about half-way up one side of the gorge, the
opposite wall shows its true proportions, whilst
the pictures are exquisitely framed by pine and
oak, or by the bold lines of the scarred mountain
buttresses.

The trail we are taking is even better than
yesterday's, and the views as we near the top are
wonderful in every direction. The bottom of the
valley lies far below, spread out like some ex-
quisitely coloured map. Of course the difficulty
of estimating fore-shortening operates from the
top, in making it very hard to judge difference of
level of objects far below you in the floor of the
valley, and so it appears much flatter than it is in
reality. The mules rest at nearly every corner of
the crooked path, giving their riders time to take
in the successive pictures. Near the summit the
ascent becomes less steep, and then leads at one
level through the pine woods, still, however,
keeping to the brink of the precipice ; then it
slightly rises again, and very soon after this the

128 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

modest little Glacier Point Hotel comes into
sight, and with it the unique and superb prospect
over the High Sierras (Plates XXXI. and
XXXII.).

The central point of interest is the Nevada
Fall, to which the eye invariably comes back, after
roaming over the miles and miles of forest and
barest rock scenery embraced in this one grand
panorama. Under a noontide sun and cloudless
sky, in spite of the waterfall, the pines, and the
few shrunken snow patches at the foot of the
distant peaks, it appeared the most parched and
thirsty landscape I have ever seen. No lakes
are visible, though at least one of considerable
size — Tenieya — lies hidden away at the foot of the
strikingly shaped peak of the same name ; and
though unseen from here, in the heart of the
many valleys, all along the streams which flow
from the melting snows, are green strips of land,
gardens of flowers in early summer, as refreshing
to the eye as are the cold rivers themselves to the
parched throat of the traveller. But none of
these are seen from Glacier Point, unless by
turning to the left one happens to catch a glimpse
of a dark indigo-looking pool, the mirror lake we
visited this morning.

At this time of day there is no shade in
the picture ; it is at its worst. But wait till
evening, and view it in the radiance of sunset —
half the thirsty sea of granite hidden in cool blue
shadows, the other rosy red with transparent
purple depths, whilst the sharp peaks, all aflame
with vermilion, blaze against a sky of pink and
amber, which fast-coming night has already

+ .* I

fei

IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA i3r

begun to invade. Or again, stay overnight as
we did, and see the dark-blue broken line of
distant peaks clean cut against the dawn. Watch
the long shadows of these monarchs of the Sierra
as the rising sun flings them across the sky, the
ever clasped fingers of the Night and Day, and,
if such things appeal to you at all, you will never
forget the sight as long as you live. After lunch
we rode on mules, first to the Fissures, which are,
in climbing language, very long, narrow chimneys,
most likely eroded by the weather, in the sides of
the Cathedral rocks. There are some half-dozen
of these, one blocked not far from the top by
masses of granite, which have been thrown into
it. Through the rest you can look down hundreds
of feet either on lower slopes of the same cliff", or
on the diminutive meadows, the river and trees
lying far below in the depths of the valley. Or,
if the dizzy height does not affect you, you can
stand out on the edge of some overhanging rock,
and look vertically down a thousand feet at the
spires of rock still two-thirds of the way up the
precipice, as they rise towards you. If you drop
a small stone over the edge, and watch it as it
falls, it grows smaller and smaller and disappears
altogether before striking bottom ; and in places,
fully ten seconds elapse before the sound of the
impact reaches your ear, counting from the instant
when you let the stone go. This gives for the
depth of fall nearly 1,600 feet.

On the return ride we visited Sentinel Dome,
with a fine view of the valley, and reached Glacier
Point just in time to see a small cinnamon bear
lurking behind the pigstye and poultry-houses.

132 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

This, they told us was not a frequent visitor by
any means, though there are many bears, including
grizzlies, in the high country beyond Yosemite.
Two or three of the men ran out to try and find
young Bruin, who had quickly disappeared, but
could only trace him for a short distance.

In the evening, by the aid of a paraffin lantern,
we walked to the Glacier Point, and sitting on a
rock there, waited, whilst our guide lit the fuse of
a carefully constructed bomb of blasting powder,
and then hastily lowered it, fizzing and sputtering,
by a long cord over the edge of the precipice.
We stopped our ears carefully till the explosion
had happened — which could be felt as well as
heard — and then opening them, waited for the
echo. It came with a crash and a roar, first from
a point on the left, and rumbled along the wall of
cliffs to the right, where from the two domes it
resounded with the redoubled vigour of deep-
toned thunder, rolling away in the distance as the
waves of sound dashed themselves against the
unseen array of peaks and precipices which sur-
rounded us in the dark. Twice we awoke these
wonderful echoes, and then groped our way back
to the hotel well satisfied with what we had heard.
If the ears are not stopped during the actual
explosion, they are so far deafened, that they
cannot hear the grand echo to advantage. It is,
besides, much better heard at night when all is
still, and reveals to the ear the immensity of the
unseen scenery around, much as light shows it
to the eye.

It was cold at night, but this was easily warded
off, and in the morning about eight o'clock we

IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA 135

both felt sorry to leave the homely welcome and
excellent fare we enjoyed during our short visit.
The long drive to Wawona lay through forests
for the most part, but I got a fine photograph of
Cloud's Rest, which looks every inch a mountain
from this road. The first part of it affords a
magnificent view of the southern peaks of the
Sierra Nevada. By one o'clock we were once
more in Wawona, and after lunch drove to see
the big trees, of which there are four groves in
the district, the Merced, Tuolumne, Calaveras, and
Mariposa. It was the last named we visited.
The road at first is the same weary and dusty
one by which we came to Wawona, and slowly
indeed did we climb it in the hottest part of the
day. Soon after passing the " black hare," one
of whose ears had decayed off and had been
nailed on again, came the turning to the left,
with its large signboard " To the Mariposa
Grove."

The excitement grew as we drove along, but
the big trees were further off than we had thought.
Meantime it seemed hard to imagine any much
larger or statelier than some of the sugar pines we
passed, yet when the turn of a corner showed us
the two "Guardians" at the end of the road so far
as we could see it, these pines, and much more
all others, seemed visibly to shrink in comparison.
It is this growing small of the trees one is accus-
tomed to think of as giants, that reveals at first
the immense girth and height of the " big trees "
(see the Frontispiece, the " Grizzly Giant ").
As the guide-book says, they are so exquisitely
proportioned, that were there no others to judge

136 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

by, one would pass them at a distance without
notice, if it were not for other qualities in which
they differ from their neighbours, and above
all, for their spotlessly clean and new-looking
trunks. These are of the colour of an unpolished
cedar-wood pencil, though perhaps a little redder.
Boldly and handsomely grooved as a Corinthian
column, they rise from spreading roots, with the
appearance of invincible strength and uprightness,
three hundred feet and more, tapering more
slowly than the trunks of other trees, except for
the first ten feet or so, in which their thickness
somewhat rapidly diminishes from, say thirty feet
to twenty or rather less. These wonderful trees
are free from all the diseases to which their
smaller neighbours succumb, and meet death only
by repeated forest fires, by the woodman's axe,
by the hurricane to which they never bend, or by
the bolt from heaven. No wonder they reach a
great age ! Over four thousand annual rings
have been carefully counted in a section taken
of a fallen monarch, and that, too, by no means
the largest tree. This, the present monarch of
the grove, is still standing, and if its rings are
distributed after the same scale, must be many
centuries older.

It is the thought of all that has happened since
these splendid trees were young striplings of the
forest that adds such solemnity to their presence.
Even when they have fallen, they lie in the trench
their great weight makes in the soft soil many
years without showing any signs of decay.
Through the hollow trunk of one of these
prostrate giants, three men may ride some

•

IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA 141

distance abreast on mules. The carriage way
passes right through the middle of another
enormous tree (Plate XXXIII.), thousands of
years old, and yet apparently in all the fresh-
ness and vigour of youth. As one drives in the
grove the eye instantly singles out the big trees,
even where they are most closely surrounded by
others. Most of them stand together in small
groups (Plate XXXIV.) sometimes of as many as
seven or eight, but it is difficult to get an uninter-
rupted view of a whole tree. Many have had their
tops broken off by storms, so that few measure
their full height. The branches are of a lighter
shade than the trunk, and arranged rather like
the flower-stalks of an aloe ; the foliage, of a rich
yellowish green, contrasts finely with the reds of
the other parts. The bark, which is from two to
four feet thick, when examined closely is found
to consist of a mass of closely woven, soft, springy
fibre. Pieces of it are used for pincushions.
The cones are wonderfully small for the size of
the tree, not being much bigger than those of the
common Scotch fir, but more compact, and egg-
shaped. We found many of them on the ground.
The sun was setting behind the pines before
we could bring ourselves to say farewell to these
beautiful trees, and so long as one of them
remained in sight we looked at nothing else.
The drive back in the darkness of a night
without a moon was a new experience, and that
we and our " Surrey " arrived safe and sound at
Wawona is excellent testimony to the skill of our
driver, who confessed that we should all have
fared somewhat poorly if he had not known every

142 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

deep rut and hole in the road by heart. In the
cool of next morning, about seven o'clock, with
all our luggage on board, we began the long
drive back to Raymond, hoping to keep, as we
succeeded in doing, well ahead of the noise and
dust of the stage. The only events worth
recording are that we saw a rare and handsome
bird, the Road- Runner, which kills snakes and
can outpace a horse ; and that we almost ran over
a small pink, earless pig lying in the road well nigh
covered up with the dust, and a very sorry sight.
Our driver thought it had been bitten by dogs.

The railway cars left Raymond about seven
o'clock, and after running for an hour to
Berenda, stopped there in a siding, where in
the sleeper we passed the night, wakened
early by a really severe concussion. This was
caused by the train to which we were to be joined
being backed into us in the most inconsiderate
way. Most of the glass and crockery in our
buffet car was broken. The evening sky had
been a magnificent sight. I never saw the Milky
Way glow as it did then, nor any constellations
shine so brightly as Sagittarius and Scorpio over
the western horizon. About one o'clock we
regained the Palace Hotel and were going
through our usual task of rearranging baggage,
After another visit to the Bank, during which
my escort refused to leave me, we paid our
second visit to the gardens. The day was very
fine but cool, and, much to our disappoint-
ment, the orchid-house was closed by the time
we reached it, and no official competent to open
it was to be found.

CHAPTER V

FTER dinner, I sallied out to see
China Town with one of the
official guides appointed by an
inspector. We soon reached the
Chinese quarter, and here one
might just as well be in China
itself. Everything is Chinese — shops, wares, and
people. The few white faces in the streets look
like foreigners, and one notices unfavourably the
lack of a pig-tail ! I thought many of the
Celestials quite nice-looking, with their clear
complexions and beautifully pencilled eyebrows.
They are exceedingly clean personally, and think
one bath at least a day as essential to happiness
as any Englishman does. I think one sees in
the perfectly cool, collected manner, even of the
shopman, the evidence of a certain feeling of
superiority : they kindly tolerate the patronage of
the heathen, and comparatively ignorant, white
man. He is so inferior a being that, suppose he
is rude and overbearing, he is to be borne with,
as a creature of a different and a lower world,

144 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

who has not learnt self-control, and is not
altogether accountable for his actions ! But none
the less, they take no end of pains in showing
their goods, and explaining the virtues of the
same ; and, unlike some shopkeepers of another
nation, are not apparently the least chagrined, if,
after examining their more curious and expensive
wares, the customer ends by purchasing little or
indeed nothing.

After visiting one or two shops, including a
barber's — the barber was working scientifically
with a small camel-hair brush on the ear of a
customer — we turned our steps to the chief
lodging-house of the quarter, a very large
rambling old building, with a central court-yard
set apart to cooking and sanitary uses, which,
my attendant told me, is a great improvement on
the old state of things, when the first was per-
formed in the cells or rooms — whichever you
prefer to call them — and provision for the second
was apparently entirely wanting ! The passages,
on one or both sides of which the small rooms
lie, are very narrow ; and one tiny apartment
will serve as the opium and sleeping chamber of
three or four Chinese.

We paid informal visits to two or three rooms,
and saw the Celestial enjoying his opium-pipe after
the long day's work, for he begins at five or six
in the morning and does not leave off till nine or
ten at night. Reclining on his bed, a blanket or
cushion placed on the shelf or floor of the alcove,
with his body and legs in the shape of the letter
G, the smoker takes out a small piece of the
sticky prepared drug from a little jar on a metal

IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA 145

pin ; he holds it close over a lamp or a candle
flame till it softens and bubbles, and then moulds
it quickly with his fingers into a spindle-shaped
lump. With the help of the pin, he fits this into
the small hole at the end of the opium pipe, and
then, slanting this down over the flame, inhales
the vapour deeply as the plug of opium melts and
vaporises in the heat. This goes on perhaps for
an hour or two, until, as my guide put it, he
becomes " full " of opium, when he extinguishes
the light and falls into a deep sleep, and, in spite
of what many say, awakes refreshed and invig-
orated for his next day's work. I only describe
what I saw. I asked many questions, and came
to the conclusion that most of these men enjoy
their opium in almost the same way as many of
us enjoy our tobacco, with as little or as great an
ill effect. The Chinamen I saw were many of
them big men, and anything but wasted looking,
notwithstanding their cramped sleeping places.
One of them possessed a cat, which regularly
took opium with him, rising to inhale the opium
smoke he blew from his lips with evident satis-
faction, until it sank into deep sleep on its
master's knees. When I saw the cat it was
inhaling its last whiffs, and settled down for the
night whilst I was looking on. They told me
that this is the only known specimen of an animal
in the world, except man, which takes opium.

I heard a small Chinese girl sing a song in
Chinese, and then a short child's hymn in English,
but on inquiring as to whether many of the
Chinese are converts to Christianity, the answer
was that many profess this religion for a time, in

146 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

order to learn English, and as soon as they have
learnt it, reassert publicly their old religion, which
they have never ceased to practise secretly all the
time. Next we visited a Joss House. The so-
called idols — I think there were five — were the
figures of men conspicuous for their bravery in the
long-past history of the empire. The Chinese do
not believe the images to be these men themselves,
but likenesses of them ; nevertheless the dead
men's spirits are near, and as the tea evaporates
from the little cups which the devout place before
the statues, they say that the spirits are drinking
up the liquid. How they explain the solid
residue I did not learn. The carving of the
altar on which these heroes sit is exceedingly
intricate and deep, and richly coloured. A sacred
light was burning on it, and is never allowed to
go out. They imagine that this light keeps
away the evil spirits, which correspond apparently
to our devils in their love for darkness, and in
their powers of annoying and hurting mankind
both before and after death.

I learnt also that the Chinese believe in the
Creator and Sustainer of the Universe, and also
that from Him come all good things, but they
picture Him as too remote to concern himself
with individual men, and as they have nothing to
fear from Him, they pay Him but little worship.
It is the terror of the devil and his legions which
greatly influences their thoughts and lives, and at
times they beat their tom-toms and clash their
cymbals to frighten these physically timid powers
of darkness away. A notice on the wall stated
that all visitors must pay ten cents towards the

IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA 147

Joss House ; we did not do so, but perhaps the
price of the fire sticks of scented wood which we
bought for a trifling sum on the assurance that
their pleasant scent was both a preventive and a
cure for noxious insects in luggage, was accepted
instead of the unpaid donation. My guide
informed me that visitors are not always allowed
to see the interiors of these houses of worship.

After paying for a seat at the ticket office, and
mounting some stairs, I next found myself seated
in a wooden rickety chair, with a few other
visitors, on the stage of a Chinese theatre, in the
thick of a play which had begun about four in the
afternoon, had continued without stopping since
then, and would not end much before midnight.
The general arrangement of the house itself was
much the same as that of any other, and from
floor to roof it was filled with Chinamen, except
one gallery, well screened off, which held, I
believe, the Chinese ladies. There was but little
talking : every one seemed interested in the play,
except a few ragged children who were running
about, some on the stage near us, and some
behind it. A few of the men were smoking,
including some of the actors not, for the time,
taking part in the scene. About a dozen
musicians filled the back of the stage, and were
playing continuously, except during the com-
paratively rare intervals of spoken dialogue on
the part of the actors. Their music was exceed-
ingly interesting, in spite of its monotony. It
was all minor ; the air, repeated with little or no
variation, being neither sad nor merry, reminding
one distantly of some brisk Irish melody. It

148 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

contained, I think, a subject and answer, each
expressed in a few phrases, and written in a mode
to which our minor seemed the nearest approach,
but different from it in a way I could not grasp,
though I tried hard. A single violin led ; there
was no proper alto or tenor part, but a
weird accompaniment, made by striking sticks of
different lengths, which emit short sounds of
determinate and high pitch ; and by a sort of
kettle-drum, a triangle, and a pair of large brass
cymbals. These last were not used all through,
but to emphasise some specially interesting part
of the dialogue, or at the close of what perhaps
corresponds to an act.

The scenery is the same throughout, namely
the stage itself, and the curtains at the back
of it. The accessories were few : a table, and
a highly ornamented arched window on legs,
reminding one of the front of a " Punch " show,
through which the man actor at one part of the
play, watched the gestures of the two women
talking together, and overheard something which
made him clap his hands and give vent to other
expressions of joy. As to the subject of the
play so far as I saw it, I could only guess,
scarcely knowing a word of Chinese, but it
seemed that the hero had taken a violent fancy
to an exceedingly shy young woman, who had to
be won over by a person who was either the wife,
or at all events an intimate friend, of the man.
He sat quietly at the side of the stage doing
nothing, whilst his ally sang his praises in a high
and rather harsh voice, following only to a very
moderate extent the music of the orchestra ; but

IMPRESSIONS OF AMRKICA m,

even after a couple of hours of this curious love-
making by proxy, the girl could scarcely be
induced to sit for a moment on the far end of the
couch on which her lover was seated, and matters
were not looking any better for him when I left.
The Chinese do not allow any women to act on
the stage, and the two I have mentioned were
in reality men, but their disguise was, to my
eyes, perfect. The feet would of course be the
difficulty, but their dresses were long, and only
the toe of a shoe peeped out now and then. Both
of them had fans, and the shy girl only rarely
ventured to peep over the top of hers ; the other
used hers much as her European sisters do.
The audience evidently followed everything very
closely, and now and then interrupted this very
even performance, with roars of laughter. Every-
where I saw intelligent and beaming faces ; cups
of tea were passed round at intervals, and in
spite of the length of the performance no one
looked sleepy or yawned.

Leaving the theatre, I visited a large club-
house, and much enjoyed a cup of tea myself,
served in Chinese fashion. Then we returned to
the hotel by a circuitous route through back
streets (which in some respects bear a strong
resemblance to ancient Pompeii), calling at a
Chinese bazaar, full of such beautiful and inter-
esting wares, and so cheap withal, that they
and the blandishments of the vendors proved
altogether too much for me, and I made several
purchases — Chinese ink, chess-men, paper-knives,
stamp boxes, handkerchiefs, a gong, two tea sets,
and other things which in New York I believe

7

150 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

cost at least three times, and in England ten
times as much, or even more. The inscrutable
Chinamen became evidently interested as the
number of purchases became greater, and finally
made me a present of a box of Lychees, pretty-
looking brown nuts, with a fruit inside containing
a stone, and tasting rather like a raisin. They
packed all my goods, and bestowed them in the
hotel that night, ready for our departure, which
took place early next morning.

CHAPTER VI

NCE more we passed aross the
bay, the sunbeams dancing on its
busy waters, and in a few hours'
time were climbing the steep
slopes of the Sierras under mile
after mile of snow -sheds ; in
fact, for more than sixty miles the rails ran
under a long, unbroken tunnel. One side is
generally rock, the other a forest of massive
hewn timber supports, which fly by so quickly
that they produce all sorts of queer effects :
sometimes through holes in the boarded walls
glimpses of the scenery can be caught, but often
it is almost pitch dark, and the traveller wishes
that the masters of the Rio Grande had seen
their way to make a summer track, as the
Canadian and Pacific authorities have done.
The great strength of the construction bears
witness to the weight of the snow in winter time,
and for the difficulties which the engineers must
have had to encounter who constructed these
wonderful links betwen east and west.

152 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

Thunderstorms were brooding over the land
we were leaving behind us towards sunset, and
again I saw the tall cumulus clouds, which seem
to accompany electrical disturbances in this part
of the world. It grew quite cold, and a snow-
storm would not have been a surprise when we
stepped down from the train and made a rush for
food at a small station. Next day found us in the
desert, though, as the line follows the course of one
of the few rivers — the Humboldt — it did not look
so thirsty as one might expect; besides, there had
been heavy rain, a great blessing, and when the
heat of the day came on, we could open the
windows without fear of being choked by the fine
sand and dust, which so often make this part of
the journey anything but pleasant. If all is dry,
and there is wind, the dust finds its way through
every chink and crevice of the car, and the in-
mates sit, hot, choked, and miserable, even with
fruit and iced water to help them to while away
the time. We experienced nothing of this sort ;
a cool breeze blew, and the fascinations of the
ever-changing diorama of gently sloping plains
and bold mountain ranges kept us busy watching
hour after hour (Plate XXXV.).

The terraces on the lower slopes of these hills
show plainly that once all this country was under
water, and any one who can at all read the face
of the land feels no surprise when in the after-
noon he sees, as we did, in the distance a long
thin, perfectly level white streak, telling unmis-
takably I that the waters of the Great Salt Lake

1 As a matter of fact, we thought we saw the lake several
times before we really did so — the hot layer of air next the

•I ^

rl

IMI'KKSSIONS OF AMERICA 155

are at last in sight. For miles we traverse its
flat, cracked, muddy shores, almost bare of vege-
tation ; what little there is, grey and withered-
looking, the leaden waters lie far away. Here
and there thin, white, glistening incrustations of
salt relieve the monotony of the dull and lifeless
waste ; or the train rushes past half-dried swamps,
with a few sad-looking rushes skirting their edge.
Towards evening the sun warms into purple the
distant lofty mountains, and kindles a golden
path on these mournful waters ; and so we bid
them farewell for a time. The scenery changes,
fields take the place of the vast stretches of
ancient sea-bed, cottages and trees appear once
more, and, as night closes in, lights sparkle like
glow-worms in the darkness ; the train draws up
in a crowded station ; we have arrived at Salt
Lake City.

Here we should have stayed longer if we had
had the time to spare, and tried to learn on the
spot something of the life and conditions which
prevail amongst the Mormons; as it was, I heard
some warm discussions in the train, and had some
interesting conversation with a man who, though
not a Mormon himself, had lived for more than
six years amongst them. To put down very

ground reflecting the lighter-coloured sky near the horizon
behind it, and the spurs of the mountains running down into
it, so as to give exactly the appearance of a large lake in the
distance. That this was only mirage was abundantly proved
by the change wrought when the railway ascended a few feet.
This had the effect of making what had looked like a number
of little islands into one long dry promontory, and shifted the
shore of the mirage-sea to a much greater distance than
before.

156 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

briefly some of the points : — The women, my
informants told me, are stronger advocates of
polygamy than the men. I asked if this was
caused by undue influence of their husbands ;
they said no, not at all. The men are exceed-
ingly proud of the Mormon faith, and often let
every one know that they are members of the
society without being asked. They genuinely
believe in the book of Mormon. Having read
the book myself, I asked how this was possible,
and was told that most of the Prophet's followers
were almost destitute when they came to Salt
Lake. Young gave them land, money, a fresh
start in life. Is it wonderful that they should
place implicit confidence in the man who has
done more for them, practically, than any one
else, and trust him in matters religious, as they
have reason to do in matters secular ? I under-
stood that Mormonism and polygamy are quite
apart ; the revelation of the " will of God " in
the latter, came apparently only to confirm and
ratify what was already the way of life of some
of the Mormons.

The city flourishes, there is no doubt of that ;
the Gentile element increases year by year, but
the "Elect" hold their own at present. It is still
unsafe, so I was told, for an inhabitant of Salt
Lake City to differ publicly in opinion from the
teachings of the Mormon priests; but the terror
of the ever- watchful Mormon eye is not so great
as it used to be. The railway has made the
means of escape much easier ; and, perhaps even
the members of the Vigilance Committee, if it
still exists, have now some respect for the civil

IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA 157

law, and for the general interest which a
mysterious disappearance will excite, if by chance
it should get into the daily papers. Polygamy
is civilly criminal, but the judges who try cases in
Salt Lake are appointed by local authority ; and
this diminishes the number of complaints to a
very low figure, and tempers the severity of the
sentence, if one is ever pronounced.

All agreed that few men have possessed such
absolute power, or wielded it more despotically
than Brigham Young. At a certain period when
Gentiles were invading the New Jerusalem,
Young thought it high time to know definitely
who were of the faith and who not. He there-
fore, in a speech or sermon, told his audience
that all his true friends were to get their garden
gates painted green by such and such a day, and,
said the narrator, by that morning there was not
a single gate to be found that had not been so
painted. Whether these assertions are true or
not I do not pretend to judge ; I only state what
I heard as I heard it.

To turn to another matter : the waters of the
Great Salt Lake are not lifeless, after all ; they
contain innumerable specimens of some micro-
scopically small but living being, the only
survival, probably, of the many forms of life
which once filled the immense inland sea, whose
waters stretched for three hundred miles or more
in all directions. The intensely salt waters of
the present lake have a very energetic effect on
the skin of bathers, and affect the eyes painfully,
producing soreness and swelling, so that it is well
to take care not to let the brine touch any part of

158 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

the face. Common salt is by far the largest con-
stituent, but, as in sea water, there are also com-
pounds of magnesium, though not in so large a
proportion.

After leaving the city, the railway runs through
mountainous country ; we could, however, see
little of it at night, though there was a moon, and
by the time I was in a state to notice anything
next morning it was broad daylight, and we were
turning out to breakfast at Glenwood Springs,
Colorado, a very unfinished-looking place, with
a fine hotel out of all proportion to any of the
other buildings, and a bridge of which I should
think the engineer feels proud. The journey
from here to Colorado Springs is through really
magnificent canon scenery. It would be difficult
to exaggerate the grandeur of the great rock
walls between which for a long distance the river
and railroad wind their way. In one place there
is not room for them side by side, and the railway
is carried by a wooden parapet built out from the
face of the perpendicular cliff, with the muddy
waters flowing close beneath. Often you cannot
see the sky at all without putting your head out-
side the window and then looking up vertically—
a position it is not easy or desirable to maintain
for long ; and so deep and narrow is this Royal
Gorge, that it is gloomy on the brightest day.
Gradually the panting engines climb the slope,
the canon walls grow lower and lower, the valley
opens out, and frequent mining sheds and tunnels
impress upon you the fact that you are in a rich
metal-bearing district.

At one point, from a break in the canon's side,

IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA 15.;

a stream of lava has flowed, and its rugged,
black cindery prominences and hollows are yet
too little weathered for vegetation to grow on
them. So far as appearance goes the eruption
might have happened only a few years ago, but
in such a rainless tract as this the time necessary
for the fertilising of a lava stream is no doubt
very much longer than in moister climates.
Even in Teneriffe, which enjoys a considerable
rainfall, lava streams a century old, such as those
near Guimar, are almost as bare and savage as
they were when first they cooled. Only one kind
of bush has as yet taken root on the stream which
overwhelmed Garachico, years before the great
gap of Pedro Gil, — the source of the Guimar
lava, — was formed in the splendid crater wall of
the Cafiadas.

All the way through the Royal Gorge the
scenery has been built of granite, but as we near
Pueblo one beautiful woodland river picture
after another flits by the carriage window, and
in the distance, over the wavy lines of inter-
mediate hills and mountains, Pike's Peak can be
distinctly seen. A grand yellow sunset, with
torn clouds, lit up the prairie as we came out
upon it, and before the light had altogether
faded, Colorado Springs, our terminus for the
present, hove in sight, and we spent the rest of
the evening enjoying the comfort of the Antlers'
Hotel, and the excellent music provided for the
entertainment of its many guests.

Next day broke grey, cold, and windy. We
were driving in a " Surrey " with a pair of black
horses, towards the "Garden of the Gods," when

160 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

a rotten pole-strap gave way, the pole fell, the
near horse all but came to grief over it, and in
saving himself burst collar and bearing-rein.
There the mischief ended ; we got out, and
passed the time gathering flowers and watching
some rifle practice going on at the butts, whilst
the driver, after a little temporary mending, went
back to the hotel to get some stronger harness.
After his reappearance, a few minutes brought us
in sight of the extraordinary rocks which, I sup-
pose, gave the name to this widely known spot.

Imagine an undulating, wooded, hilly country,
sloping down to a level plain. Just where the
hills and plain meet, there rise, as though they
had been pushed up suddenly from below, and
had nothing whatever to do with their present
surroundings, a long line of most aggressively
red, almost vermilion cliffs. This line is broken
in places, but can be followed by the eye for
many miles along the foot of the Pike's Peak
satellites, and wherever it appears the scenery is,
to say the least, very unusual. In spite of their
great height — and I should think many of them
attain two or three hundred feet — these cliffs
are most surprisingly thin, and fill one with still
greater astonishment when seen endways on
(Plate XXX VI.). They appear to consist of a
kind of sandstone, which in a moister air would
most likely have perished quickly ; as it is, the
weather has worn them into grotesque shapes.
From the point where the two main groups of
these strange rocks are seen, one in General
Palmer's very pretty garden, and the other some
distance to the left, many of them look like

o

IMI'RKSSIOXS OF AMERICA

queer images of gods rising out of the earth.
Others resemble camels and birds ; there are two
seals on the sky-line of one of the rocks, remark-
ably well carved by Nature's own hand. One
almost wishes that the coachman would not insist
in pointing out and naming these chance effigies ;
they are so plain that he must be indeed devoid
of imagination who does not see them for him-
self— and a hundred others, too, which have not
been named. Further on we passed a huge
boulder — of the same red substance — resting
on a very small area. Often the forms of the
rocks made me think of the Parson and Clerk,
and other yearly disappearing landmarks on the
coast between Star Cross and Teignmouth,
in South Devon ; and from the similarity of
colouring and weathering, I imagine the nature
of the rocks is very similar. We passed some
" Mushroom " formations, too, but none to com-
pare in beauty with those in Monument Park,
described a little further on.

We were now rapidly nearing the mountains,
with the great Peak overtopping them all ; and,
after a short piece of downhill road, reached the
little town of Manitou, and stopped first at the
Soda Spring. Its cold water gives off carbonic
acid gas copiously on rising, and has a rather
pleasant taste. In a shop close by is a fine
collection of minerals found in the neighbourhood
—agates, green felspars, endless specimens of
quartz, green, purple, and colourless ; iron pyrites,
realgar and orpiment, crocidolite, azurite, mala-
chite, and many others, both interesting and often
very beautiful. We made a limited selection of

164 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

these, and then trudged to the Pike's Peak
station, and took our seats in the car for the
summit, over 14,000 feet above sea-level, but
only 8,000 above the prairie plains. To travel
the eight miles from Manitou to the top takes
about an hour, and the transition to the rarer air
is so rapid that almost every one is much more
aware of the difference than he would be if he
had taken the usual twelve hours allowed for the
ascent on foot. Some feel a slight pain in the
region of the lungs, others are sick and giddy,
and all, so far as I could judge, disinclined to
exert themselves. By those accustomed to the
temperature of the plains, the cold of the summit
is keenly felt. Many seemed to have had no idea
of how much colder it would naturally be up here,
and shivered about the stove in the house which
crowns the Peak, audibly wishing they had
brought great-coats, or their feminine equivalent,
whilst snow was falling outside.

The day was cloudy, and though the nearer
views on the way up were good, a dense mist
covered the summit, and the prospect was conse-
quently a perfect and absolute blank. This did
not tend to raise the visitors' spirits. They
clustered round a bar-like counter, sitting on high
stools, and eating lunch, and were evidently
pleased when the time came for going down
again. Soon after three o'clock every one had
gone except ourselves. The evening brought no
change in the weather, but the wind rose, and
sleet drove hard against the window-panes. We
passed the time in base luxury, from a moun-
taineer's point of view, sitting by a roaring stove,

IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

and talking of Cripple Creek and fickle fortune
with the summer inmates of this mountain hotel,
one of whom at least knows by experience the
excitements and disappointments of gold digging.
About ten I went to bed, but not to sleep ; the
howling and roaring of the wind, and the creaking
of the many doors, and perhaps the effect of the
lighter air, kept me awake hour after hour, till
about 5 a.m., when the voice of one of the men
outside told me that it was still misty, and that
it would be a mistake to get up to see the sunrise.
Though it may be hard to believe, I submitted to
remain where I was without a murmur, and
instantly fell sound asleep, to be awakened at
once, it seemed, by the same voice, with the news
that the fog had disappeared and that the view
was unusually clear.

In twenty minutes' time I was photographing
right and left with yellow screens and isochromatic
plates, and hope that the results may show friends
at home what some parts, at least, of the marvel-
lous panorama are like.

The summit of the Peak is so broad that from
any one spot only a small fraction of the whole
view can be seen. The slopes of the mountain
itself, and the many lower hills near it, always
form the foreground, but less looking towards
Colorado Springs than on any other side. The
town itself looks like a little vegetable garden,
laid out in neat little squares, with narrow white
paths between, the distance being too great for
the unassisted eye to distinguish separate houses
( Plate XXX V 1 1 . ). Beyond the Springs, the prairie
stretches out like a sea, becoming bluer and bluer,

166 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

till it ends in so even and flat a horizon line, that
a hasty observer might well think it the ocean
itself. Faintest grey in the far south — nearly two
hundred miles distant — is the long low ridge of
Fisher's Peak ; fifty miles nearer, Spanish Peak,
a shade darker, but still only to be seen by careful
search. Wisps of smoke cloud alone reveal the
cities and villages, just awakening to another day
of their busy life. West and north lie range upon
range of hill and mountain, variegated with the
deep blue velvet of distant wood or flitting cloud
shadow, till all the country seems an ocean whose
mighty waves have been enchanted by some song
of heaven, and stand still evermore to listen, No
view from any mountain-top I know quite equals
that from El Teide of TenerifTe, but here the
prairie sea almost makes up for the lack of the
true ocean meadows, and the distant peaks extend
the possibilities of sight far beyond what would
be its limits were there plains on every side alike,
at the same high level as these.

Outside the hotel is a large thermometer. The
men told me that its readings were once noted
regularly, but as no one ever paid any attention
to the notes, the observations have been discon-
tinued. It surprised me a good deal that the
opportunities this Peak presents to the astronomer
and physicist were not made use of — and in
America, too ! What would not some of us give
to have this one mountain in the Old Country !
I suppose the day will come when, as from the
Lick telescope on Mount Hamilton, and from Mr.
Lowell's in Arizona, from Pike's Peak also will
come the latest news the light from sun and star

IMPKKSSION'S OF AMERICA 169

and planet has to tell. The anemometer would
have a fine chance of making a record up here, if
what I hear is true, that sometimes the wind
attains the truly fearful speed of 162 miles an
hour ! And a hurricane is only ninety ! No
wonder the walls of the house are three feet thick,
and that great pains have been taken to make the
foundations secure. The cog-wheel cars are
comfortable enough in quiet weather, but the
people in them must have an exciting time when
they arrive at Windy Corner on a rough day.

Before noon the first train arrived. From the
remarks I overheard, the excursionists seemed
greatly to enjoy the sights. Almost every one of
them sent a telegram to some friend, answer
prepaid — partly, I think, because this house is the
highest telegraph office in the world, and partly as
a sort of souvenir. After registering our names
in the visitors' book, we began the return journey.
The engine went first, and slowly let us down.
On the step outside, a grey and elderly man
amused himself, and apparently a few of the
passengers, by aiming at anything which hap-
pened to attract his attention, from a small wild
bird to a large leaf or a stone, with an air-gun. I
am not certain whether he was not trying to go
as near as he could to the objects, whether living
or inanimate, without actually hitting them. If
so, he was a good shot, and a humane man — but
this does not explain the hilarity of some of the
passengers.

The lake and woods seemed to be rising up to
meet us, rather than we descending to them. In
places the banks along the side of the car-way

170 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

were all ablaze with dark purple and golden-eyed
Michaelmas daisies, or with clusters of sunflowers.
About one o'clock we were once more in Manitou,
and looking back to the far-away summit and the
little speck of a house we shall always remember
with pleasure.

That afternoon we drove through Ute (pro-
nounced "eut") Pass to Cascade canon. The
entrance to the canon is a fine piece of rock
scenery, but after passing it, the drive is rather
uninteresting as far as the dangerous level-cross-
ing, with its most sensible warning board and
bell. Then it grows prettier, and the little canon
itself quite repays a visit. It is a narrow and
steep gorge, with a stream flowing through the
shady woods in a series of small cascades, very
much like the Tore Waterfalls near the Middle
Lake, Killarney. It is well that we visited it
before seeing the two Cheyenne ("shyen")
canons, or even Williams' ; these, though it
would be a mistake to compare valleys so
different, are much more impressive, and, I
think, should be left till last. On our return to
Manitou we found the road blocked with people
and horses, and witnessed a rough race of the
latter along the high-road. The car back to the
Springs was crammed with passengers to a per-
fectly ludicrous extent. They were hanging on
like bats to the posts which support the roof,
all very cheerful and none the worse for their
holiday, which they call, curiously enough,
" Labour Day."

CHAPTER VII

HE Garden of the Gods had dis-
appointed me in one respect.
For many years I believed that
in it are to be found some of
the finest specimens of earth
pillars, objects which are among
the most curious results of the action of rain and
streams on a particular arrangement of soil. In
fact it was chiefly to see these that I had come
to Colorado, for well-developed instances of them
are exceedingly rare, and with the exception of
those in the Austrian Tyrol, I had never heard
of any other very fine ones. It is true that near
the balanced boulder, there are in the Garden of
the Gods some low mushroom formations, as they
call them there ; but these are very poor compared
with the pictures of the earth pillars in books on
geology.

It was only after asking most persistent
questions, I found out that a district called
" Monument Park " was likely to satisfy my
curiosity, so we determined to spend next day

172 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

there, and began by driving some miles along the
white and dusty Denver road. Before actually
reaching the Park, a lofty white pedestal on the
right, capped by a flat red stone very much like
a college cap, told me that my wishes were to
be fulfilled, and in a very short time the camera
was at work again, photographing this splendid
pillar, with Pike's Peak for background (Plate
XXXVIII.). There are two or three more,
quite close, on the top and by the side of the
low hill, and the smaller ones illustrate admirably
the way in which these curious and most striking
objects are formed. Later in the day we passed
hundreds of them, but none finer than the first
one.

To explain them roughly is easy. A hard, flat,
and thin stratum of rock, which cracks, but is not
worn away fast by water, rests on some softer
soil. Rain falls, sinks through the cracks in the
upper, hard layer, and hollows out the soil below,
first by its dissolving action, and then, when
outlets for the tiny underground streams have
been found in the face of a cliff, by mechanically
wearing it away in narrow ruts with almost
vertical sides, ever growing deeper and dividing
the ground into columnar structures, each with
its hard cap of the top soil (Plate XXXIX.).
Meanwhile this top soil is itself affected by the
rain, the expansion and contraction caused by
summer and winter, or by the hot days and cold
nights. Sometimes it is split by the freezing of
moisture in its pores, and so it falls, little by little,
into the miniature canons, in fragments to be
gradually dissolved or swept away by the trick-

IMPRESSIONS OF AMKKMCA 177

ling water ; except where it rests securely on the
pedestals of softer soil below, and there it is left,
high and dry, partly protecting the pillar beneath
it from the direct action of rain (Plate XXXIX.).
But in time wind and moisture triumph. The
supporting column grows thin in places ; the rock
cap, no longer level, slants more and more
towards the side on which the weather takes
most effect, until it falls. Sometimes its thin
neck breaks, or the wind lifts off the loosened
cap ; and along the old river cliffs in Monument
Park hundreds of these strange figures may be
seen, in all the stages of their long life, from the
sturdy young earth pillar, just born from the
retiring cliff — short, thick, and with a large and
new-looking cap level set — to the tall, gaunt giant
with spindle neck, nodding with age and infirmity ;
or the last stage of all, without cap, or neck, or
waist, or anything — a mere low, shapeless lump of
the softer soil.

It gives one a strange, eerie feeling to come
upon a group of these white figures, on the
borders of the wooded cliffs, standing round and
apparently discussing some dry topic in their
unheard and unknown language. One can
almost tell from the slant of their caps their
several characters and sentiments. Here are to
be found, frozen to stone during the day, but
surely alive and moving when no one is looking,
the White King and Queen from far - famed
Alice's Wonderland and Looking-glass country !
Here are the Pawns, and the Duchess, and the
White Rabbit ! And surely between the trunks
of the pines in that " tulgey " wood, one can see

178 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

something that can be none other than the dread
" Bandersnatch " itself!

I do not think people know what they miss in
leaving Colorado without seeing Monument Park.
My driver said that hardly any one ever came
here — I suppose because they never hear of it ;
and the photographs I afterwards found in one
or two hotels are not by any means flattering ; so
much in a landscape depends on colour as well as
form, to say nothing of stereoscopic effect, and,
possibly, motion. Every one should see the
" Quakers," and the beautiful groups which lie
on its right side as you drive from the farmhouse
near the " Quakers " towards the mountainous
side of the Park. Do not be content with the
view from the carriage ; you must wander all
about them -before you can possibly form a true
opinion of their beauty (Plate XL.).

The caps of these pillars seem to be made of
a dark red sandstone, the bodies of conglomerate,
as if a coarse granite had been disintegrated
by water, and then the quartz lumps cemented
together with the clay derived from felspar. At
a moderate distance the lines of horizontal strata
in which this soil has been deposited are clearly
visible, both in the pillar structures and on the
main cliff; but in two or three instances in the
first group you meet after passing the farmhouse
alluded to, there are also some slanting, slightly
projecting ribs of apparently harder material,
which I cannot explain, except by supposing that
they mark the course of veins of matter forced
up into the already stratified material of which
the pillars are mainly composed. These lines cut

--

I

—

IMPRESSIONS OF AMKRICA iSi

the horizontal layers, which are quite distinct, ;it
a very considerable angle — say 45°. I hope both
sets of lines will be visible in the stereoscopic
photographs (Plate XL I.) I took of these par-
ticular pillars, which, taken as a group, I thought
the most beautiful of all. They are about twenty
feet high, and lie within a hundred feet of the
road.

The trail leading out of the Park is in a very
bad state, but it runs through a peaceful and
happy-looking valley, and our slow pace only
gave us the more time to enjoy it. The frequent
gates are rather a hindrance to progress all
through, but when the last is left behind you
drive lightly over the springy grass, and on every
side there are prairie dogs sitting up watching,
or scampering off to their burrows.

It was a lovely evening, calm and brilliantly
clear ; the sun set in a bright white sky behind
the mountains, whilst all the eastern heavens
flushed orange and pink, and it was nearly dark
before we regained our hotel. After dark the
waterworks were turned on to flood the meadow
at the back of the house. When the moon rose
it shone through the trees, and, with the many
lighted windows, made lovely reflections in the
still water, whilst the strains of the string band
left nothing wanting to make the evening repose
and pipe enjoyable. I am bound to say the
summer nights seem to me shorter in America
than even in Norway. No sooner is one asleep
than it is time to be getting up ; the ruthless
knock at the door leaves no possibility of doubt-
though it is very pleasant to feel that you can

182 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

depend on being called exactly at the hour you
wish. How many countries might learn a lesson
from the States in this respect ! And what a
difference all day is made by an early start,
especially in hot climates !

We intended to see the Seven Lakes, and
were told over-night that a start must be made
soon after seven in the morning ; and at seven
precisely we jumped into our "Surrey," and in
the delightfully fresh morning air jogged slowly
along towards the mountains. Then the ascent
began through Bear Creek Canon, and continued
for about six hours ; the horses simply crawled
the whole time, stopping to rest every dozen
paces. Probably this slow pace is necessary, as
no change of horses can be had, even though
each halt allowed the sun to climb a little higher
and reduced the chances of any shade later on ;
but it was certainly rather trying to patience.
For part of the way the dust was also choking.
At last we looked down on Loch Marie, which
is often spoken of as one of the Seven Lakes.
This is untrue ; the Seven Lakes are not reached
till you have crossed the watershed, and if the
hint may be given without offending anybody, it
is well to make it thoroughly understood before
starting that you wish to see the first three or
four of the Seven Lakes, and not merely to go as
far as Loch Marie and then turn back.

The road begins to rise again more steeply as
you leave this wild and beautiful sheet of water
behind and below you, and the finest part of the
whole drive by far is the open mountain scenery
between the lake and the highest point. I

<c .-

rt F

-^ — •

>- Js i

U3

IMPRESSION'S OF AMERICA 185

expected to see over the top of the pass the
Seven Lakes stretched out, one beyond another,
in a long, shallow valley. Our driver's answers
to questions as to their whereabouts seemed to
me vague, and on asking him how large and
what shape they were, how far from one another,
whether the fishing was good, and other ques-
tions, he became more and more confused in his
answers, till I inquired point-blank whether he
had ever been on this road before, to which he
answered plainly " No." This made it much
more interesting for all of us, when, on reaching
the watershed, a glance at the valley in front
showed nothing large enough to be called a lake,
though there certainly was a huge bog just below
us. Two trails were also visible, one running to
the right along the hills up a side valley to some
mines, whilst the main track, after a rather steep
descent, ran along this side of the morass and
disappeared round a corner.

To see whether the Seven Lakes were in the
side valley, I followed the well-beaten trail to the
right on foot, and very soon got a clear view
right away to the end of it ; but no lakes of any
description were to be seen. Meanwhile, an
army of black clouds was drawing up its forces
on the southern slopes of the Peak, and distant
thunder announced that the elements were
already actively engaged. I hastened back to
report to the " Surrey's " occupants the necessity
for moving on to some more sheltered spot ; but
we had not gone far when a cold wind struck us,
simultaneously with a grand roar from the
clouded skies, and a few large drops of storm-

i86 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

driven rain. Fortunately some campers' tents
stood near, and after asking permission to enter
one of the largest of these — a request no sooner
made than granted-*— we had our luncheon-basket
transferred to the tent, and began to make merry,
sitting on the wooden benches, unpacking the
good things and laying them out, after a clearing
had been swept on the old table, crowded with
all kinds of biscuit boxes, candlesticks, and empty
bottles.

Our host had been in this spot all the summer,
cooking for a camping-party, and told us there
had not been a single warm day for weeks.
Heavy hail was rattling on the canvas whilst he
was speaking, and the stove hissing and splutter-
ing. The only warmth seemed to be that of our
sympathy for the cook. It grew really very cold,
and when the hail changed to rain few parts of
the tent were free from drips. Water came
stealthily in under the canvas, along the ground,
so that valuables had to be moved to the islands
left. The carriage cushions, which were of a
watertight material, proved most handy foot-
stools, and for the time, at all events, I felt no
desire whatever to camp out in these high
regions.

We gave our friend a cigar and a pear ; he
seemed particularly pleased with these trifles,
saying that he had seen an apple or two that
season, but no pears, and as to the cigar — "Ah !
we don't get them new things up here !" I think
he also appreciated something else of an effer-
vescent nature, which, however cold at the time,
kept us warm till the sun came out once more ;

LMPkKSSIOXS OK AMKKICA

and with heartfelt thanks for the shelter and the
tea — for amongst the other luxuries we enjoyed
was the drinking of very strong tea, fresh from
the stove, in tin cups — we drove on, and found
two or three of the Seven Lakes, shut in between
steep wooded slopes, about a mile and a half
from our impromptu camp. Three men were
encamped on the shore of the first. One of them
told us they were fishing, but the sport so far had
not been good ; and as for the weather, the less
said about it the better.

It was too cold, after the warmth of the plains,
to enjoy anything much, so we turned our horses
homewards. Often glimpses of the great plains
in the V-shaped gaps through which the road
runs remind one of the blue sea filling in the
space between the gentle green slopes of some
Cornish valley. And so once more out into the
prairie, under the same strange kind of sunset as
we had last night, all the east flushed with pink,
whilst westward the sun sank behind dark indigo
mountains, with a bright white, hazy cirrous sky
over them.

Next day was our last whole day in Colorado.
We had already dedicated it to the two Cheyenne
canons, and after an early breakfast, armed with
a hamper full to overflowing (as the salad dress-
ing proved only too literally), with a hot sun
behind us, but a deliciously cool breeze blowing
from the mountains in our faces, we sped swiftly
along the narrow roads to the place in the woods
where the ways to the North and South Canons
diverge, and then made for the former. The
entrance is grand, and the grandeur lasts for

i88 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

quite a mile along the road. It seems a pity
that one cannot get the first impressions of these
gorges by driving down them from their upper
ends ; then at every turn the rocks right and left
become higher and higher, and the most impres-
sive part of all is seen last ; whereas, entering
them as we do, the finest part is seen first, and
makes the rest seem tame in comparison.

This is especially true of the canon I am now
writing about, and there is little to be gained by
following the carriage track further than the place
where tourists usually stop. My driver told me
there was no place to turn higher up, which
proved absolutely untrue. If you wish you can
follow the road as far as it goes, and there is an
excellent turning-place just where it becomes a
mere foot-trail at the foot of a gold mine, the
entrance to which is closed by a padlocked door
with a bell ! In front of this door, and about six
paces from it, is a broken-down wire fence, with
a wicket to which is attached a notice, written
by hand, to the effect that visitors may see the
interior of the mine for a small sum — twenty -five
cents, I think — but it adds rather curiously, that
if you pass the gate you have to pay the fee.
The rocks and sand about here are full of " fools'
gold," a kind of mica, so far as I could make out,
with a yellow, lustrous surface, easily splitting
into thin plates, and soft and soapy to the touch.

The same red sandstone rocks which form the
most striking feature of the Garden of the Gods
add their gorgeous colouring to the mouth of
this canon ; they are of a rather deeper shade,
and browner than in the Garden, but rise much

IMPRKSSIOXS OF AMERICA i8c;

higher, and are magnificent objects when seen
far above the pines which grow thickly in the
bottom of the valley. The reds and greens rein-
force each other by contrast, and it seems to me
that so far as colour goes this Northern Canon is
the finer of the two, but does not approach the
Southern in grandeur.

We returned to the fork of the roads, and in a
few minutes reached the toll-gate which lies at
the entrance of the South Cheyenne. There we
parted with a dollar apiece, an entrance fee which
does not seem at all excessive when you have left
the gate behind you and are driving or walking
(for we found the roof of the " Surrey " shut out
far too much of the view) along the road which
winds by the stream up this superb canon. It is
exceedingly narrow, and shut in on both sides by
stupendous precipices of savage rock. On the
floor of the canon grow some very fine pines, and
behind and above these the walls rise so per-
pendicularly that it is break-neck work to gaze
at their summits for long. We walked in deep
shade, astonished at the grandeur of it all, even
after the many splendid sights we had seen,
whilst the hollow murmurs of the stream echoed
from side to side.

They say this spot is wonderfully beautiful by
moonlight ; and no doubt it is so, and if we had
had time we should not have left it without a
nocturnal visit. Here, as in all other grand and
narrow canons, the photographer is completely
foiled, and I might add, the artist also ; the preci-
pices are far too high and too near to be repre-
sented in a picture. Of course views can be

IQO IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

taken looking straight up and down the stream,
but these, fine though they may be, fail to give
any idea of the profound impression the near
view of the cliffs never fails to produce. Even
in Norway comparatively few are the precipices
so naked as these ; perhaps those most similar
are to be found in the recesses of the Upper
Aurlandsfjord, that very fine but comparatively
seldom seen branch of the Aurlandsfjord which
lies on your right as you come out of the far-
famed Naerofjord.

We lunched in the large summer-house on
the right of the road, and I photographed the
"chipmunks" whilst they shyly nibbled bits of
bread and cake thrown out for them on to the
slopes of coarse scree fallen from the canon
side [Plate XLII.] The old chipmunks were
very fat, the young very lean, but beautifully
coloured. A table, however rough, would have
been a welcome addition to the fixed forms,
the sole furniture in this shelter, which must
be grateful indeed to the traveller, should
wet weather come on. Meantime the canon
resounded with the shrieks and cries of a number
of school-children, who appeared fairly to revel
in the extra noise the nature of their surround-
ings made them able to raise. If the voices had
been only rather fainter and less full of pleasure,
I could easily have imagined that they were the
" thin, shrill screams " of some long procession
of spirits, driven through the mournful passage
leading to Orcus by the compelling Messenger
of the Gods ; for the sunlight had faded out of
heaven, and under a canopy of cloud the walls

o

Q

IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA 193

looked gloomy, cold, and stern, as any of Dore's
pictures of the Inferno.

The gorge turns to the right soon after passing
our picnicking spot, and on rounding the corner
one is surprised to find how short the canon is.
It ends in a small basin, completely shut in with
high precipices. On the right, as you enter, a
stream plunges in seven successive stages down
the grim water-worn wall ; only the last three of
the seven are visible from the bottom of the
canon, but on the left of these as you look at
them, a steep zig-zag of substantial ladders,
resting on strong supports, firmly fixed into the
almost perpendicular cliff, makes it possible and
easy for any one to ascend past all the cascades,
and to get a grand view of the cul-de-sac from
above. At the top you are in an open valley,
prettily wooded, and the flowers and shrubs by
the side of the gentle stream form many small
and exquisite pictures. Further on, there are
gold mines, but we did not travel far. On the
way back we made a halt for photographic
purposes, and after regaining our carriage, drove
back to the Springs by the road which leads past
the Casino, and affords lovely views of the
prairie and of the Pike's Peak Mountains.

At dinner, some printed notices laid by our
plates reminded us that the kinematoscope was at
work in the town, showing in several separate
scenes the fight between Fitz-Simmons and
Corbett. Wishing to see how such exhibitions
in America compared with those at home, I took
a seat, perhaps rather too near the screen, and
witnessed the struggle between the two athletes.

194 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

The flicker was unpleasant throughout, which
means that somehow or other more pictures
should be thrown on the screen per second ; and
what is more trying to the eyes is the want of
correct "register" in successive views, which
causes the whole view on the screen to wobble up
and down through a small distance, perhaps two
or three inches. This often made it impossible
to follow any rapid action, and I should think
might be partly due to the nature of the film on
which the pictures are taken. On the whole, I
do not think this particular show was nearly
so good as the " Biograph " entertainment in
London.

One thing interested me a good deal. I
noticed that a man sitting next to me viewed the
pictures through two small holes, cut out in a
sheet of dark-coloured paper. He told me it
notably lessened the flicker. I tried the plan,
and found it work, as my informant said: but
it cut off too much light to my mind, so I did
not use it long. Several of the scenes which
happened just after the wrestling were shown.
A man passing in the foreground looked up for
an instant towards the audience with a tragically
woe-begone expression, whilst the conductor or
expositor, whichever he should be called — simply
remarked, "That is Mr. So-and-so; he has just
lost 70,000 dollars ! " Perhaps that is not the
exact sum mentioned ; in any case it was large
enough to provoke most unfeeling mirth on the
part of the spectators.

CHAPTER VIII

S our train for the East was not
due to leave the Springs till the
evening, and we did not wish to
lose any chance of seeing more
of this wonderful region, to which
I found we grew more attached
every day that we stayed in it, we spent the
morning next day in Williams' Canon. Whilst it
is not nearly so grand as the South Cheyenne,
the entrance is the narrowest I have seen, and is
only an inch or two wider than the breast-pole of
a " Surrey." The rocks, too, lie in thin strata,
almost horizontally, and are often very much
undercut, projecting over the road in huge flat
slabs. The cliffs of Moher, Co. Clare, or that
dark headland of Muckross, not far from the
little-known but exquisite coast under Slieve
League, Donegal, are like these, but on a larger
scale altogether.

Near the top of the canon the road crosses the
bed of a stream, and winds in long zig-zags up the
western side of the cliffs. The first part of the

195

196 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

track lies far below, white and narrow, and over
the canon appears the endless prairie. We stop
for a moment at the Cave of the Winds, and then
proceed by a footpath for a few minutes across
the ridge dividing Williams' Canon from the Ute
Pass : a magnificent panorama of the Peak and
its attendant mountains, all bathed in sunshine,
opens in front ; and when a carriage-road takes
the place of the foot- trail, there will not be a
finer drive than up the one canon and down into
the other, and through it home again ; and the
Caves to be seen on the way will add to the
attraction. I hope this road will soon be made ;
it will not be a very difficult task, so far as I can
judge.

After descending a few steps, the little wooden
house in front of the Manitou Grand Cavern lies
before us : the guide lights two paraffin lamps,
hands one to me, and with the other leads down
a long, cool passage, stopping now and then to
point out curious stalactites. At our special
request, he makes straight for the so-called organ,
a set of these hanging, brownish-white spindles,
high up on the right side of our dark road.
Kindling a piece of magnesium ribbon, he holds
it up so as to cast the different "pipes" into
relief. We can see them all clearly in the cold
light. They are close together, the longer ones
in the centre of the group ; each tapering nearly
to a point at the lower eud, and joined to a boss
of the crystalline limestone formation at the
upper. So far they are only a fine group of
stalactites — nothing more ; but the guide takes a
sort of drumstick with a muffled head, and strikes

IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA 11,7

the organ-pipes in some well-learnt order, and all
through the dimly-lit cavern ring soft, bell-like
notes, but of a peculiar character, sometimes
almost nasal, but impossible to express in words.
Thus we heard " Rousseau's Dream," and other
airs, ending with "God save the Queen"-— the
tune of which, curiously enough, as learned at one
of the late Sir F. Gore-Ouseley's lectures given
in the Sheldonian Theatre at Oxford, was com-
posed (as it should have been) by a veritable
" John Bull."

I find that considerably more than a complete
octave of each of the diatonic scales of C and F
can be elicited from this wonderful, natural
musical instrument. I heard both of these scales
played, and can vouch for the truth of the state-
ment. The intervals are not accurate, and in
some cases the curious overtones of which each
resultant sound is composed, make it a little
difficult to hear the actual note intended, but
there is no difficulty in recognising any tune in
the least degree familiar. I asked the performer
whether he got more than one note out of a
single pipe, thinking it likely that a tube, if hit
near the free end, would give a sound much below
that which you would hear most plainly if it were
hit nearer its root, and I found that he did use
some of the pipes in this way ; but the true
marvel of such an instrument lies in the immense
improbability of a chance arrangement of deposit
from hanging drops of hard water yielding rods
of such length and thickness as to give the
succession of notes actually found here. In the
Cough's Caverns at Cheddar, in Somerset, to

9

i9« IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

my mind the finest to be seen in the Old
Country, there are three stalactites next each
other in one place, which give the common chord
(I forget in what key), but I have never heard of
any fortuitous result of the kind to compare with
this grand organ, which must rank as one of the
musical wonders of the world. I asked whether
any of the stalactites had been artificially shortened
to raise the pitch of their notes, and was assured
that nothing of the kind had ever been done ;
that one or two had been broken off short by too
rough handling, my guide admitted, but declared
that otherwise they were just as nature made
them. After listening again to the scales played
up and down, and with their soft liquid notes still
ringing in our ears, we came out into the blinding
daylight again, and drove back to the Springs,
through the Garden of the Gods, frequently
stopping to photograph,

It was a glorious day, and the monstrous rocks
of the Garden looked more impressive than ever.
If we had only had time, and Colonel Palmer
had been at home, I should have liked to inspect
the little canon behind his house, where perhaps
lurk unsuspected wonders. As things were, our
last natural curiosity was a dyke of gypsum, some
of it finely crystallised in fragments of what is
popularly called satin spar. But even whilst
looking for specimens of this, thoughts of packing
would intrude ; and so it turned out that, thanks
to the excellent electric car service, it was but
little past six when Antlers' received us, and from
then till we left we were both engaged in the
indescribably exasperating process of trying to

IMPRKSSIOXS OF AMKR1CA

get original luggage, plus accretions, into the
compass of the orginal packages. But it was
done at last, except for the gong and the jar of
preserves ; the first was altogether of a different
dimension to the available space, and the second
had shown already what it would do by way of
vengeance if once locked up in a crowded
portmanteau.

Soon after eight o'clock, in bright moonlight,
we watched the sparkling lights of Colorado
Springs, as they grew nearer and nearer together,
and fainter and fainter in the rapidly increasing
distance; and, when they had gone, the fast
fading outlines of Pike's Peak. So to the last we
were reminded of our visits to the different valleys
and passes, and felt genuinely sorry to be saying
a long " Goodbye " to a district so full of
delightful things.

As I write, it seems more like six weeks than
six days since we first saw the Peak in the
distance, and quite a year from our landing in
America. By far the best part of our trip is
over. Looking back, it is very hard to say
which we have enjoyed most, each place has been
so different from the last. Niagara every one
talks so much about, that mere curiosity to see if
they are right would make one visit it. Then
as to Yellowstone Park, there is no other place
at all like it in the world ; and so it could not
possibly be missed out. Yosemite — the peerless
valley — Norwegian scenery may give some idea
of it, but then in Norway there are no big trees,
and the most vivid picture must fall far short of
the grand reality. And lastly, Colorado, perhaps

200 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

a little disappointing at first sight, is a place which
after even five days' stay it is not pleasant to
leave, as we are finding out by experience. For
myself, I simply wish I could live in all these
places at once — yes, and a thousand more. How
soon, alas, the memory of colours fades ! How
impossible it is to recall those of any scene in
detail ! — almost harder when looking at a photo-
graph with its one tint, than in the darkness of
night, by unaided imagination. This, perhaps, is
one reason why the roughest colour-sketch made
on the spot gives such satisfaction afterwards.
Poor as it is, it helps the weak memory, and
brings back to the painter, if to no one else, the
reality, and also the true and wholesome sense of
how very far he failed to represent it.

But to continue. We are now in Tarry Town,
on the Hudson, after three days of uninterrupted
travel, the roar of the train not yet out of our
heads ; very glad, in spite of the comfort of Ameri-
can trains, to think that we have no more of them
to look forward to, for it has been exceedingly hot,
even for this part of the world. Fortunately we
managed to secure beforehand for the whole of
the way the privacy of the little compartment
which goes by the name of the drawing-room ;
although, as one of the black servants told
me, some prefer the car proper, adding, " The
drawing - room's the worst place if anything
happens."

Let me draw aside the curtain for a moment :
Time about 3 p.m. Position — somewhere west of
Kansas City (and in many other places too).
Place — the said compartment. Persons — H. and

IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA _>oi

myself, sitting opposite each other; H. lies back
in the corner of the seat with closed eyes, or
looking through, instead of at, a book ; I, with a
wet sponge constantly damp forehead, cheeks,
hands, and wrists. Four wet towels are suspended
by their full length in different parts of the little
room. I rise slowly to re-soak one of them,
now dry, though thoroughly wetted only twenty
minutes ago (twenty seconds, it seems to me).
No word is spoken — but much is implied. The
towel is rinsed, and brought out dripping with
warmish water, and after I have silently applied it
to the windows, which dry almost as soon as
wetted, it is hung up. A sponge is also useful
to sprinkle water over the floor ! I look at the
thermometer, dangling by a bit of string from
overhead, and remark aloud that it reads 96°
instead of 98°, and then sit down and try to
read " Father Stafford " in a disconnected kind of
way : but cannot remember where I left off before
wetting the last towel again. Just as I have
found the place, the train slackens, and draws up at
a station, but the blind is not raised even an inch
to look out, for fear of undoing any good the wet
towels may have done. Again I rise, and feel the
evaporators (!) — two of them dry and stiff already !
Soak them afresh — take a sip of iced water — so
does H. The heat seems doubly great in this
station ; the woodwork near the windows is
almost too hot to touch. Look at thermometer—
again 98° — and say, " Two hours more of this ! "
The big bell of the engine clangs like a tocsin,
and off we go, whilst the struggle with the heat
begins anew. This continues till near sunset.

202 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

I read a sensational article in one of the papers,
headed in the usual heavy type, to the effect that
an American professor explains the abnormal
number of sunspots this year, by supposing that
a new planet is about to break off from the sun,
and draws a glowing picture of the effects this
may have — nay, is even likely to have, on the
earth. In our present condition, I could almost
believe that his predictions were already beginning
to be fulfilled, and wish the train were steady
enough to let me steal a look at the sun through
the powerful little telescope I carry in a handbag.
Later on, during a stop, I get a steady glimpse,
by putting a piece of match-smoked glass before
the eye-piece, but not a single spot is to be seen ;
so, if there are any big ones, they must be round
the other side, and we still have a few days left !
In the smoking-room there are two or three
men, more asleep than awake. One of them,
however, opens conversation by "guessing" I'm
from England, and I reply by some questions on
silver as a standard metal. He tells me, " All
that's played out." I said I understood it was a
burning question in America. " Well," he replied,
" it was — but it don't trouble us now." The
others joined in, and, much to my surprise, they
seemed to think that things had far better remain
as they are, and expressed their conviction that
" no one knows what would have happened if the
Silverites had had their way."

Kansas City at last ! But what a black, smoky
sky ! and how intensely stuffy the air is. The
sinking sun shows through like a dull red-hot
plate. Every one is complaining of the heat.

IMI'KKSSIONS OF AMKKICA Jo.}

The thought of staying in the atmosphere inside
and near the depot for two hours is intolerable.
We drive up the steep hill above the station, to a
large hotel, and are speedily lifted to the highest
storey. With open windows, just a breath of air
is to be had ; and so we sit, with a small tea-table
between us, till it is time to drive down again. It
is a little cooler now, but still a long way over
80° F., and after settling in for the night's journey
I open one window. This is a mistake. Whilst
sleeping, multitudes of gritty cinders flock into
my berth, worse than bread-crumbs. Towards
midnight, on waking, the altered colour of what
is generally white is quite plain, even by moon-
light, and much shaking and smoothing with the
hand is necessary before anything like sleep can
be had. Even then, it is only broken, and in the
grey uncertain light of the dawn, on looking out,
I find we are crawling, evidently with extreme
caution, over the great Mississippi, into whose
waters we look straight down from the car's

windows. ftByptl i.

What a gra-na sight this noble river is ! We
are about midway over now, and the trees and
houses on both shores look quite small and dim ;
and how the girders of the long bridge creak and
groan with the weight of the train ! The oily
waters flow beneath the tracks with never a ripple,
reflecting the moon clear and round ; and as we
near the opposite shore, it is just light enough to
see that every tree and stone is mirrored in the
sleepy river. The bridge, I afterwards learnt, is
one of the finest in America, and more than
strong enough to stand any strain to which it is

204 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

the least likely to be put ; but just now it is under
repair, which fully accounts for the way we crept
over it. And so on to St. Louis ; and, after
another broiling day, to Cincinnati.

That night, in passing through the Alleghany
Mountains, our engines break down, and for a
while we make very slow progress. Then, just
before coming to one of the many tunnels, the
drivers spy some horses on the line ahead. All
the noises both they and the engine can make
have not the slightest effect. The horses refuse
to get out of the way, and of course, if the train
starts before they are off the line, they will be
driven into the pitch-dark tunnel. To prevent
this, two or three of the men alight, and some
time passes before the animals are driven to the
side.

By morning, the prettiest part of the scenery is
past, but there is a cool breeze blowing, and we
fly past river and woods. Here some boys are
fishing from rocks, which must make the stream
quite impossible for any vessel larger than a
rowing boat to navigate. There, a group of
bathers laugh and shout. Presently country
villas crop up on the hillsides ; they thicken and
become a city, whilst yonder white and stately
dome, rising far above all, proclaims Washington
Capitol without need of words. Again I wish
for a spare day ; all I can do is, regardless of
any possible regulations, to swarm up the green
embankment which shuts out the view of this
marvellously grand and lovely building from the
station, and, gazing at its upper parts, supply the
rest from memory of photographs and pictures.

IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA 205

Even this partial view is not to be forgotten
quickly. Some day, perhaps, I may see it again
with plenty of time to spare ; and also visit the
places sacred, not only to the people of the
United States, but to all who reverence earnest,
resolute men, devoted to the best interests of
their country, sometimes at the sacrifice of life
itself.

But time is up, and again we speed east, flitting
past wide estuaries and low shores. The sky
becomes overcast, and, in the double gloom of
cloud and twilight, we steam into Jersey City,
under heavy thunder-showers. It feels quite
cold ; and whilst we wait for the Hudson river
train, the heavens are constantly lit up by brilliant
flashes of lightning, one every four to six seconds,
chiefly white and blue. There is little thunder,
showing that the discharges are mostly between
cloud and cloud, or spread over wide areas ; but
what there is might fitly prelude earth's final scene.

The cars for the Hudson are crowded with
interesting and lively people, who seem to think
for themselves, and not to allow, as so many in
the Old Country do, others to do all the thinking
for them. They consequently differ in opinion
and practice more than we do amongst ourselves ;
and, if it is true that the hope of a race lies in
differences both between individuals, and in
environments which tend to foster these differ-
ences, and thereby differentiate one man from
another, the States have a bright future before
them. From the little I saw and heard they are
happily free from institutions which, by a species
of mental or physical oppression, turn out sets of

206 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

men all alike. True progress seems to me bound
up with the preservation and practical recognition
of the right of private judgment, a right which,
although half secured in some countries at the
cost of tremendous sacrifice, some men do not
appear to appreciate, and make very little effort
to preserve from the hands of others, who are
anxious, for reasons only to be guessed, to do
their thinking for them.

But by this time the train has reached Tarry
Town, and in the darkness we drive up the steep
hill to the Mot House. The absolute quiet of
this peaceful spot is very delightful after our days
of travelling ; which, I suppose, seem longer to
a " Britisher " than to most visitors. Our ex-
presses are so good, and the distances they run
so small, that even the journey from the Scilly
Isles, by G.W.R. to London, and thence to Perth,
and Inverness, and so across to Strome Ferry and
Portree — the longest trip I have made in our
Islands — seems nothing in comparison.

Last night I was worried by a mosquito, and
think I ought to mention it, because it is the only
one I have seen whilst in America. It is now
dead — of that I am certain — but it took much
trouble to locate, spite of the persistence with
which it sought a violent end. Perhaps it
imagined that with a little more perseverance, the
repeated blows which were intended for it, but
which it avoided with such consummate skill,
would prove fatal to me, either directly or
through supervening exhaustion, and leave it
complete master of the field and feast : the
event, however, turned out otherwise.

IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA 207

To-day we have seen one or two " places " of
the wealthy people of New York, and think them,
and all the citizens, most fortunate in having such
scenery within so short a distance. The gardens or
parks (they are not exactly either) are beautifully
kept by quite a host of gardeners, I should fancy ;
and the blue and sparkling river, dotted over with
the white sails of dainty yachts, sailing by ruddy
cliffs and high banks of trees, forms a scene so
bright and full of pure pleasure, that it must soon
drive away all but the worst city cares. Yet I
hear that, just at present, these delightful places
of retirement and rest are taxed far beyond what
seems reasonable to many people — even, perhaps,
beyond the actual value of the land. If so,
visitors may possibly enjoy the prospect more
than the owners. I, for one, feel grateful for the
permission to drive through, which I believe is
generously extended to all alike.

The woods and fields are full of ferns and
flowers, and the open view from the top of the
hill is exquisite — one of the most restful combina-
tions of river, wood, and gentle rounded hills
imaginable, with low white houses and cottages
peeping out along the winding shores. A deep
veranda, with a large number of most comfortable
chairs scattered about it, runs right round the old
house ; and our last evening in the New World
slipped by in silence, broken only by soothing
country sounds — the faint chirrup of a sleepy bird,
the muffled steps of lovers and their lasses,
enjoying the delights of a moonlit ramble, free at
last to exchange their one or thousand thoughts.
Now a bat wheels its circles of noiseless flight

208 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

just by our heads ; or the thud of distant screw
or paddle draws the eyes to where glimmering
lights on mast and hull are passing on the dark
water. Then all is hushed for a time, except for
the leaves of the creepers, stirring in the cool
night breeze, while the waning moon creeps up the
sky. We must go indoors — and so good-night.

Not much more remains to be told. Eight
o'clock next morning saw us in a heavily-laden
" Surrey," carefully descending the hill. We
reached New York in a train crowded with
business men, and drove straight to the Ferry,
and thence to the R.M.S. Teutonic.

Gliding down the wide estuary, we watched
the dark Statue of Liberty. The profile, which I
think might be much finer, gradually changes to
full face as we steam slowly by, and, from this
point of view, the figure is very grand, even
inspiring. Perhaps the best wish one can frame
for America, or for any other country, is, that it
may find the true spirit of liberty dwelling with
its people, whether they live under monarchy or
democracy. History has often proved that the
form of government matters little compared with
its spirit. Whether America is freer from the
bondage of money, party, and sin, than other
nations are, must be a difficult matter to deter-
mine, even for those who know her and other
nations well ; but, whatever be the truth, it was
surely a noble thought that prompted the erection
of this colossal witness to the professed ideal of
the world, at what is the very entrance to the
Western half of it for so many hundreds of
thousands. And whilst she stands, a solemn

IMI'RKSSIOXS OF AMKRICA 209

monument to the struggles of past years, with a
grave welcome for the stranger, and a blessing
for those who are leaving, she seems to bid all
who pass to keep the torch burning, and, when
their days of work are run, to hand on the sacred
flame to others.

Before long we had left the statue far behind,
and, with a bright blue sky and calm sea, the long,
low coast gradually faded and vanished. Of the
six days following but little need be said. Every
one knows how comfortable a splendid boat like
the Teutonic is. What was described as a " head
sea " in the abstract of the log given to each of
us on reaching Liverpool, we scarcely noticed.
With pleasant company and congenial companions
the time flew as fast as it ever does. We had
two horned toads on board, brought by one of
the passengers from Colorado. They were
occasionally let loose on deck, and stirred
up to take a little wholesome exercise. Once
one of them made straight for a lady reclining in
a deck chair, who did not exactly love toads, and
disappeared under her skirts ; to say that she
took no steps to avoid, nor yet to displace, the
little creature, is to reveal that it was not every
one who enjoyed the homeward trip as much
as we did. The Commander very kindly
listened to some of my ideas about the Gulf
Stream ; but, though he agreed that much had yet
to be done to unravel the North Atlantic currents,
his own experience did not give me any positive
support. He said that in the early summer he
found evidence that the general Easterly drift
was stronger than in the winter ; but he did not

2io IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA

oppose my arguments from the tracks of the
bottles, except to state that he thought it likely
that prevalent winds had more to do with their
directions than ocean-currents proper.

And so the story of our wanderings ends.
Already it seems hard to believe that we, our-
selves, picked up the gigantic fir cones, which
somehow look bigger here than ever they did in
their native woods ; and as we sit in cosy chairs
before the flickering firelight at home and talk
over our American experiences, we seem already
to be recounting incidents in some dream, so
altogether apart from our every-day scenes and
events do they appear.

It was only on the return voyage that the
chance word of a fellow-passenger made me
think seriously of publishing this simple story :
and if it should help Americans to know how
much their grand country is appreciated ; still
more, if by chance it should draw their attention
to any points of beauty and interest they have
not before noticed ; or if it kindles the wish in
them, or in any one else, to see for themselves
the wonders of the places we visited, and to write
their own impressions, which must differ widely
with different people and circumstances, the
objects of the writer will be fully attained. And
so he bids farewell.

APPENDIX I.

NOTE ON THE GULF STREAM.

HE following short paper is in the main the
result of a systematic examination of the
Chart, showing the paths taken by bottles
thrown overboard in various positions in
the North Atlantic, which is published,
along with the monthly Pilot Charts, for
the instruction and assistance of navigators,
by the Hydrographic Office, Washington, D.C., under the
auspices of Charles D. Sigsbee, Commander, U.S.N. Should
the results of further efforts to unravel the North Atlantic
currents strengthen the theory which I venture here to put
forward, my debt to the Government of the United States will
be still further increased.

From the chart I saw, and of which the Captain of the
Etmria kindly gave me a copy, I infer that the Gulf Stream
is, to a certain extent, a periodic current. The reasons on
which this conclusion is based are the following : —

(i) If two bottles are thrown into the sea near the
Newfoundland Banks, one at the end of June — say when the
ice is brought down by the Labrador currents to low latitudes,
and the other — say in February — when the ice is frozen in up
north, the first takes a due easterly and then southerly course,
whilst the second goes in the direction of the Gulf Stream as
generally drawn in atlases (Keith Johnston's e.g.), i.e., in a
north-easterly direction. Thus, by separating the bottles into

212 APPENDICES

two groups — (a) thrown in between the beginning of April
and the end of July ; and (b) between the end of November
and the beginning of March — we obtain, as a rule, two very
different pictures to represent the Gulf Stream, so far as
longitudes east of the longitude of Newfoundland Bank is
concerned. This is well borne out by the chart referred to,
and furnishes the principal argument.

It is impossible, otherwise, to account for the way in which
some of the paths of bottles cut others at quite large angles —
unless the winds are the chief and direct causes of the motion
of the waters, in which case the Gulf Stream, so far as our
coasts are concerned, is not a true ocean-current, but a drift.

(2) The Gulf Stream being a surface current of warm
water, if it meets with a large extent of floe ice and bergs,
it must be either deflected, or part with its heat in melting the
ice, or carry the ice along with it. It cannot avoid the ice by
flowing beneath it. That part which meets the ice must
expend nearly all its heat in melting it, for every Ib. of
melting ice requires i Ib. of water at 80° C. to melt it (and the
Gulf Stream water is certainly not more than 25° C. at the
point where it meets with the ice of the Labrador current), the
2 Ibs. of water thus formed being at o° C. Thus if this part
of the current survives its impact with these ice remnants at
all, its waters must be so cooled that they sink below
the surface — the bottles show that they do not exist as a
surface current running north-east — and, if they sink under-
neath, the additional friction must very greatly reduce the
undercurrent's speed ; if, indeed, there is any speed left after
threading through the ice : and, lastly, experience does not
point to any great transfer of the ice by the Gulf Stream in a
north-easterly direction.

The bottles seem to me to show that much of the current is
deflected, so 'that it soon bends round to the south, and,
joining the general westerly drift, circulates past the north
shore of South America, and, hugging the shores of the Gulf
of Mexico, rejoins the Gulf Stream at the extremity of Florida.
The course of several bottles fully proves this ; and, if the
times of their circulation be taken, indicates that they take
about seven hundred days to perform the circuit, the very
much larger value in one or two cases showing that they have
made this circuit two or more times before getting into the
Gulf Stream when it is unimpeded, and so finally being landed
outside the limits of the recurrent path.

APPKXD1X 1.

It will follow, too, that the time of year at which these
circulating bottles pass through the Straits of Florida must
settle in which direction they eventually go ; if it is about June
or July they will circulate again, until they happen to return in
the winter or spring when no ice is about, and then they will
be carried north-west to the shores of Great Britain and
Europe.

(3) The Captain (and he says he will answer for many
others of his class agreeing with him) thinks that very much
still remains to be done before men can say they under-
stand the North Atlantic currents. In the winter, although
the ice is fast up north, the Labrador current seems to be
stronger than in the summer — judging from the increase in the
length's run by the steamers when in the sphere of its
influence. He does not think that the large icebergs and
floes found south of the Banks can be the same year's ice, as
there would not be enough time for it to come so far south
between its melting (in April or May) and its being observed
in June.

On the other hand, a Montreal leading man tells me that in
June, or before, the way to the Atlantic is practically open for
traders from that part of Canada — who often meet with very
little ice, though always with some — and if it were not for this
they would not at present be trying to open a road for ship
traffic north of Newfoundland. Earlier than June, he says,
the ships have to come south of Newfoundland by an almost
land-locked channel.

A glance at the bottle-chart ' will be sufficient to prove that
though throughout the year the surface waters show an easterly
drift, they cannot be said to move as they should, if the
ordinary maps of the Gulf Stream represent facts. Take the
paths of bottles like 61 and 34,* for example, cutting at an
angle greater than 45° ; or see how the tracks cross each other
south of Newfoundland, and at once it becomes clear that
even making the allowances for the errors inevitable to this kind
of experiment, something must cause the water in which the
bottles are embedded (all but neck, and in some cases
shoulders) to vary its direction through large angles. The first
question to be answered is, what happens where the warm Gulf
Stream and the ice brought down by the cold Labrador

1 Reproduced on page 216.

J The numbers refer to the number given to each bottle on the chart.
IO

2i4 APPENDICES

current meet ? Warm water and ice being both specifically
lighter than the cold sea water underneath them cannot avoid
such a meeting ; that they do so meet is abundantly proved by
the fact that the ice floes and bergs are not carried further
south by the cold current. Neither the ice nor the warm water
can descend below the surface. If the Gulf Stream is strong
enough to carry the whole body of ice with it, then it seems
that the floes and bergs should be found further east than they
occur ; and even if carried along in this way, the effect of the
large masses of ice in 'cooling the warm water of the current
would be very marked from the length of time during which
they are in contact. But the masses of floes and bergs are
found to collect from the end of May to the beginning of
August mainly in groups lying west of 42° W. long. ; most, in
fact, west of 48° W. long. ; and their tendency is to drive
in a southerly rather than north-easterly course. It seems
scarcely possible that the Gulf Stream should thread these
masses of floating ice; it would with less difficulty carry all
along with it. It should be borne in mind that the ice is
continually forced further south against the Gulf Stream by
the powerful current from the north — it is a sustained conflict
of the two currents — and although the Gulf Stream might be
able to carry with it the ice floes, were they in still water
to begin with, the result is at least likely to be very different
when they are subject to a continuous acceleration — the very
fact that the floes remain in about the same position, or drift
very slowly south, would tend to prove that either the two
streams were fairly matched on the ice arena, or that there the
advantage is slightly in favour of the Labrador opponent.
Further, the two currents do not merely slide past each other.
Innumerable observations prove beyond doubt that each
current is separated by the other where they meet, into long
streams of alternately hot and cold water, the icy fingers of the
North clasped in the warm grasp of the South. The fogs often
follow these water stripes, and a very curious form of mirage
sometimes results, in which the horizon appears shaped thus —

on j

\*/a.rm.

AI'PKXDIX I. -'15

the depressed portions being over the warm streams, the
elevated over the cold. Probably along with this point-blank
contact there is also sliding contact. If so, the ice floes should
be set rotating to the north of the Gulf Stream, in the cyclonic
direction, i.e., contrary to the hands of a clock. There seems
but little direct evidence for or against such a rotation ; if it
exists at all, it is very slow. Thus it does not appear im-
probable that much of the warm water is so far entangled, or
cooled in melting the ice, that it is no longer specifically lighter
than the colder water below, and so, mingling with it, ceases to
travel as an ocean current proper. For the rest of the Gulf
Stream, there seems but one course open to it. Its direction
has been deflected almost due east by the accumulated ice,
level with, and south of the Banks ; or if not exactly deflected,
it is only the southern portion of the current, which has not met
with ice, that survives to flow eastwards, and this has a far more
easterly direction than the northern (due to the spreading of
the hot water on the surface of the cold). Moreover there is
no reason why any northern component of the Gulf Stream's
motion should ever be replaced if it has once lost it, for (a) it
must lie on the surface being warm water, hence the form of
the ocean bed cannot affect it, and (6) the shore, which in the
Jirst part of its journey gave it a northerly impetus, is hundreds
of miles further west ; thus, once let it be deflected in a more
southerly direction, it will remain so, flowing eastwards, growing
thinner and cooler, till at last, joining water of its own specific
gravity, it becomes lost in the Equatorial Drift westwards, or
the south travelling African current. Thus so far as the
Atlantic north of lat. 42° is concerned, whilst the ice is melting,
there will be little or no true warm ocean current crossing it.
Objects floating on the ocean waters will be left to take their
direction from the prevalent winds, and these being at that
time of year chiefly north-westerly, will give them paths more
south-easterly than they would have followed had the Gulf
Stream been present to contribute a north-easterly component
to their motion. And so one is naturally led to suppose that
if a group of bottles be thrown overboard at different seasons
in about the same part of the ocean, we shall find that the
mean direction of their course is more northerly, if they are set
afloat at the time when all round the coasts of Newfoundland
the ice is riveted to the mainland by the frosts of winter and
spring ; and more southerly, when the summer sun has thawed
he bonds which held the ice in check, and set it free to float

2l6

APPENDICES

southwards on the cold waters of the Labrador current. We
shall expect some variation from variations in the weather of
different years ; but since accumulated evidence shows that
the liberated ice drifts are at their maximum in the part where
they meet the Gulf Stream water in June and July, often

of considerable magnitude in May, and not altogether melted
even by August, we shall expect the southerly routes to occur
in this part of the year, the southerly tendency being less
noticeable as a rule in late April and May, August and Sep-
tember, than in June and July. Conversely we shall expect

API'KXDIX I.

217

the most northerly paths in January and February and March,
the coldest months of the year, and a distinct but gradual
recovery from the summer's tracks already in progress from
October or even September (by which month the ice is usually
melted) as the ocean current little by little overcomes the
inertia of the more slowly moving waters ahead, and once more
establishes its north-easterly course. The table bears this out
in the most striking way, as will be seen in the following selec-
tion from it.

EXAMPLE i, in which the paths are shown by arrows parallel
to the apparent mean direction of path.

The dotted line parallel to the bottom of the page signifies
a path whose mean direction lay east and west.

The numbers in the circles refer to the number of the bottles
on the chart.

Group of bottles started close together in Mid-Atlantic about
51° N. lat., 30° W. long.

2i8 APPENDICES

EXAMPLE 2. — Group started not very far from the west
coast of Ireland, i.e., lat. 50° N., long, about 20° W.

EXAMPLE 3. — Pair started off Newfoundland, 49° N. lat.,
50° W. long.

No. 14, started in June, went south to Bordeaux.

No. 26, started in November, went north to Glasgow.

EXAMPLE 4. — Pair started S.E. of the Banks, 42° N. lat.,
45° W. long.

No. 8, started in October, went south to West Indies.

No. 40, started in March, went north to Brest.

EXAMPLE 5. — Or take the four southerly courses of the four
bottles which, starting from different places, landed in the Bay
of Biscay. Arranged with the least southerly course first.
No. 3, May 21.
No. 14, July 24, 1895.
No. 62, July 25, 1896.
No. 61, June 24.

If this hypothesis of the variability of the Gulf Stream, so far
as the Atlantic further east than the latitude of Newfoundland
is concerned, is correct, the time of year when this ocean
current should have its maximum northerly direction is in the
late autumn, from the day when, after it has practically over-
come all the ice, it has had time to re-establish its north-
easterly circulation, to the day when the fresh ice, which by
early spring has formed a wide solid peninsula jutting out far
east and south of Newfoundland, extends far enough south to
graze the Gulf Stream — this, so far as I can learn, happens in
January or February — so that during March and April the
northernmost waters of the Gulf Stream will then probably
suffer some deflection or loss, in meeting with and melting the
south-eastern limit of this vast floe. Thus, though the great
mass of warm water will have a free path north-easterly
across the ocean to our shores, even as late as the beginning
of May, the tracks of bottles will not be likely to run quite
so rapidly north as they do in late autumn and early
winter.

From May, through the hottest months of our year, though
an easterly drift undoubtedly continues, due to the direction
of the prevalent westerly winds, I believe that there is little or
no Gulf Stream proper, east of the latitude of the Banks and
north of lat. 42° say ; and if so, a fresh instance of wonderful
economy is afforded, for the hot water is largely used in melt-
ng ice during the months when the climate of Western

APPENDIX I.

219

Europe is warm enough without it, and is free to flow towards
the Old World only when summer is waning, attaining its
highest north-easterly velocity during the coldest part of our
year, when without the remains of such a warm current, or the
moist air blown from it, our ports in all probability would be
fast bound with ice.

Appended is a list of all the bottles thrown overboard north
of lat. 40° N., and west of long. 30° W., exclusive of Nos. i, 7,
8, and 77, on account of the remarks made in the printed
notes attached to the chart. They are arranged so that the
first is that which took the most northerly mean course, the
next less northerly, and so on, and the date of starting is
attached to each.

A very slow drift,
miles per day.

All went north.

This was found in prac-
tically the same latitude as
that in which it was set afloat.

AH went south.

No. 6, *May 21, 1893
No. 30, Nov. 26, 1895
No. 33, Jan. 13, 1896
No. 34, Jan. 25, 1896
No. 36, Feb. 21, 1896
No. 27, Nov. 3, 1895
No. 39, March n, 1896
No. 26, Nov. i, 1895
No. 40, March 20, 1896 /

No. 3, March 21, 1893

No. 71, Sept. 5, 1896
No. 50, May 8, 1896
No. 62, June 25, 1896
No. 55, June i, 1896
No. 14, June 24, 1895
No. 61, June 24, 1896
No. 72, Sept. 7, 1896
No. 15, July 17, 1895
No. 5, *March 26, 1894

Though there are two — curiously the first and last — which
do not conform to the hypothesis, and which are marked with
an asterisk — to say nothing of the effect of storms — the track
followed by No. 6 is rendered doubtful by its average drift
being very slow, and No. 5 started rather to the east of
the Gulf Stream's course as usually marked.

To sum up : Our present maps of the Gulf Stream are
broadly untrue to nature, because they show the more

220 APPENDICES

northerly and the more southerly courses of the Stream as
though they existed at the same time; whereas the truth probably
is that only one of them exists — the Southern — in June and
July, whilst only the northern flows in January and February.
In other months there will be more of one and less of the
other, according to the nearness of the particular month to
the seasons above mentioned, and the particular meteoro-
logical conditions of the year. Moreover the southern current
at its strongest will not be so strong as the northern, since
it is only that part of the Stream which has not met with the
cold Labrador current and its ice ; and this southern current
falling in quickly with the trade winds is soon deflected west-
wards, and so prevented from warming the coasts of Africa at
their hottest seasons.

The Gulf Stream, east of the Bank of Newfoundland, would
thus appear to be periodically variable both in direction and
in volume.

APPENDIX II

ON THE INCREASE IN THE APPARENT BREADTH
OF THE AMERICAN FALL, DUE TO THE LINES
OF FALLING FOAM

That the lines of falling foam cause an apparent increase in
the breadth of the American Fall is proved, I think, by inspec-
tion of the two pictures of the Falls in the accompanying
illustrations : one shaded by furrows, the other left plain ;
the plain one, to my eyes, appearing not so broad, and also
a trifle higher than the other, though as a matter of fact it
is the broader of the two. It is well known that of two equal
straight lines, one divided into a number of equal parts
by short lines, and the other left intact, the divided line
always looks the longer ; but the fact that stout people wear
dresses striped vertically, and always avoid those striped across
(i.e., horizontally) — the effect of the former being to make
them appear thinner or taller, or both, and that of the latter
the reverse — this at first sight seems to imply that the Falls
should look both higher and narrower from the effect of the
foam furrows, which the illustrations show is not the case.
The illusion produced in articles of dress is due, so far as I
can see, to the lines narrowing together towards the sides,

, /•. 220.

APPENDIX II.

o\vinur to iheir being seen in perspective, and not only to the
fact that the stripes are vertical.

Thus the square (a) with equidistant vertical lines looks a
little broader than it is high, whilst the precisely equal square
(6), shaded with the same number of lines so as to resemble
the front view of a striped dress on a person, looks higher than

it is broad ; and moreover, if the two squares be compared,
the " perspective " square seems to have shorter horizontal
edges than the other.

The effect is still more striking when the square, shaded so
as to look cylindrical, has a greater number of lines as (c).
In judging of the relative dimensions of the squares, the eyes
should be as centrally as possible over each in turn.

224 APPENDICES

APPENDIX III

MIRAGE

Mirage, a curious optical illusion, which is far more com-
mon on a small scale than most people imagine, depends upon
two facts : —

1. That the place in which one sees an object depends upon
the direction the rays from it take when they are entering the
eye, and not on the path they pursued when leaving the
object; and

2. That rays of light only travel in straight lines under cer-
tain conditions, so that suppose A is an object (vide Fig. I.)
reflecting or emitting a ray of light, A B C, which is curved
downwards, entering the eye of an observer at C, the latter
will not see A where it really is, but somewhere along the line,
C D, which is the prolongation in a straight line of the part of
the ray, ABC, just entering the eye at C. Now if, on a
certain day, the air is much more dense (from cold, say) near
the ground than it is higher up, the rays will actually be bent
like this, so that all objects in the position of A will appear
lifted up, and things may become visible which would, under
ordinary circumstances, be hidden by the curve of the earth's
surface, or are, as we generally say, " below the horizon."

On the other hand, if the sun has heated the surface of the
ground so that the air near it is much hotter than that higher
up ; or if it is the Gulf Stream which has heated the air over
its warm waters with the same result; the rays of light are
curved upwards, as in the second figure, where A is supposed,
for example, to be a particle of a white cloud, or of blue sky,
sending a ray, ABC, which enters the eye of the observer, C,
in the direction of C D. The result will be that C will see A,
not at A, but at some point along C D — say D. The distance
from C to D in both cases is, generally speaking, very nearly
equal to C A, so that, as a rule, mirage does not make objects
seem much nearer or more distant. A little thought will show
that the nearer the eye is to the ground the more favourable is
the position for seeing a mirage ; and often by stooping or
lying down such effects may be seen when they are scarcely
noticeable four or five feet above the ground.

There is another effect which is due, not to the refraction

APPENDIX III.

225

or bending of the rays of light, as they traverse layers of air of
different degrees of rarefaction or density, but to that curious
and perfect reflection to which rays of light are sometimes
subject if, in travelling through a medium, they fall obliquely
on a surface separating it from a rarer stratum. This is best
explained, perhaps, with the help of a figure.

Suppose A in Fig. III. is a point of a distant object — a moun-
tain, say — one set of rays, A O C, travel straight in the colder
air to the eye of an observer at C, and by these rays he sees
the mountain at A where it really is ; but another set of rays

Fig. III.

from A, which would not ordinarily pass near him, are reflected
at B, which lies on the surface, F B G, which separates the
denser medium (cooler air) above from the rarer (warmer air)
below ; and these reflected rays, entering the observer's eye at
C, in the direction B C, cause him to see the reflection of A
at D. Thus if there is a line of mountains near A, these
will appear as though reflected in the surface of this layer of
warmer air, and the layer itself will perfectly simulate the
appearance of water, the reflections following its every move-
ment, just as they do the waves and ripples with which the
surface of real water is troubled.

226 APPENDICES

APPENDIX IV

SOME OBSERVATIONS OF TEMPERATURE MADE AT
THE BASE OF THE HORSE-SHOE FALL, NIAGARA

To Count Romford, and Dr. Joule, of Manchester, we owe
the knowledge that the energy due to the motion gained by
i Ib. of water falling 777 feet, if all turned into heat, and
applied to the i Ib. of water, would heat it i° Fahrenheit, or
f ths of a degree Centigrade.

Now the Canadian Falls are 162 feet high, and if the energy
of motion gained by the water in its descent through this
vertical distance were all turned to heat, and all the heat were
used to heat the water, the river would be not quite -|th of a
degree Centigrade warmer below the Fall than it is above it.
As a matter of fact some of the energy is spent in pulverising
the water, some in producing the sound of the Falls, so that
the rise of temperature due to this cause could not be quite so
great ; moreover, heat is used up in evaporation, and the
energy of motion is partly expended in overcoming the resist-
ance of the air, and in setting it in motion to form the furious
blasts of wind always blowing near the descending waters, so
that the difference of temperature, taken as recorded, cannot
possibly be accounted for in this way; and I am unable at
present to offer any explanation of my observation except that
possibly there may be some springs of warmer water along the
base of the precipice over which the St. Lawrence falls, which,
mixing with the newly fallen waters, raise their temperature.
In the midst of so much fine mist one would suppose that
there would be scarcely any evaporation from the liquid on
the thermometer.1 I can only repeat that my great surprise at
the thermometer's readings made me verify them very care-
fully. The instrument placed in the torrent forming the
stream was certainly more than a whole degree Centigrade
colder than it was in the stream the torrent formed after fall-
ing. It was totally immersed in both, and gave the same
results as before, when enclosed for some minutes wet in its
narrow air-tight metal case. In the latter case evaporation
could not, so far as I can see, possibly have affected it.

1 It must be borne in mind that this is not a comparison of the tempera-
ture of the water above and below the Fall. All the readings were taken
at the base of the cataract.

\PPK\niX V

APPENDIX V

PHOTOGRAPHIC METHODS

So many photograph nowadays, that possibly a word or two
on the methods which have enabled me to bring home my
negatives and develop them all in England successfully may
not be out of place. The plates used were Edwards' isochro-
matic medium and instantaneous. Where a good result
depends upon the rendering in monochrome of the compara-
tive brightness of colours, such as green, yellow, orange and
red — which is very often the case in Yellowstone Park and in
Colorado — yellow screens were employed. These cut off
much blue light, and give time to the other colours to impress
the plate. Of course the exposure is increased. For instan-
taneous views of Niagara and the Geysers, where it was
desirable to catch the forms of rapidly moving masses of
spray, the Thornton Pickard focal plane shutter is invaluable,
and experience proves that exposures of 3^-5 th of a second,
with a stop of f/s, are quite long enough to yield good pictures
of these light-coloured subjects in the brilliant sunshine which
is so continuously met with ; and in scenes like the canons
and forests, and any, in fact, in which the look of distance is
necessary to give any idea of real size, stereoscopic views are
a great advantage, though the 3^ x 3^ inch size of each picture
is not an artistic shape. Some little time ago the author redis-
covered ' a simple way of viewing them in stereoscopic reliei
on the screen as large as life. Seen thus, the effect is astonish
ingly realistic.

The safest way to carry glass plates seems to be to pack
them tightly in pairs, film to film, with nothing between, and
to wrap up the boxes in oilskin and tie them firmly round.
Films present many obvious advantages, but the author holds
that if the photographer be anxious to secure the very best
results he must use glass plates properly backed. He is
accustomed to enlarge his quarter-plate negatives to 25 x 21
inches, and, if considered desirable, can secure a picture as
large as this sharp all over. He would like to add that a pale
yellow screen is invaluable for taking panoramic views from
mountain tops, especially if there be any haze, and is also use-

1 The author has learnt that Sir Howard Grubb first discovered the
method — which gives the effect of solidity by means of a rotating slotted disc.

228 APPENDICES

ful in conjunction with an isochromatic plate for views deficient
in contrast, also on cloudy days and after sunset, though not
for the sunset sky (over the west) itself.

With the exception of a small book by Professor Piazzi
Smythe describing his experiences when camping in the
Cafiadas of Tenerife, the author believes this is the only
book in which the illustrations have been published stereo-
scopically. He hopes the result may be sufficiently satisfac-
tory to stimulate the interest taken in this charming branch ol
photography.

APPENDIX VI

GEYSERS— A NEW THEORY

Bunsen was the first to explain their action, and made it
possible for Tyndall to construct a model which imitates, to
some extent, a geyser. The temperature at which water boils
depends mainly on the pressure to which it is subjected. Under
ordinary circumstances this is always about fifteen pounds to the
square inch, which is the force with which the air presses on
it ; consequently, we are accustomed to say that the boiling-
point is 212° F., 80° R., or 100° C., according to the scale of
the thermometer used. But if the pressure on the water is
increased, the boiling-point is raised, i.e. the water must be
heated to a higher temperature before it will boil ; and if it be
lowered, ebullition will occur at a lower temperature.

If a deep boring be made into the ground, and the tempera-
ture be taken at different depths, numerous experiments prove
that for the first sixty feet, in ordinary circumstances, it is variable,
depending on the season of the year; at about sixty feet the effect
of the summer's heat and winter's cold is no longer felt, and
the temperature is the same all the year round. Below this it
rises, in England, i° F. for every fifty feet you descend; but this
amount varies in different countries, and the most rapid rise is
recorded in volcanic districts, like that of Yellowstone Park, or
Naples. But in no case has a more rapid rise been observed
than that of i° F. for every fifteen feet, or i° C. for every twenty-
seven feet (about). Imagine, then, a long column of water in a
shaft which descends into the earth ; the temperature of the
water in the shaft will rise as its depth increases. If the liquid
is free to circulate, since water expands, growing specifically

\lTK\m\ VI.

lighter as it is heated, the warmer water from below will be-
constantly rising next the hot walls of the tube, whilst the cooler
waters from above will sink down the central line of the shaft
in a convection current, which evidently tends to distribute the
heut ; and if all the water were thus maintained at one tempera-
ture, if it boiled at all, it would only be near the surface, where
the pressure is obviously least. But suppose that, for some
reason (e.g. the friction which tends to stop the flow of water
in a narrow tube, or a slant of the tube, which would greatly
slacken the pace at which the water ascended as it would also
slacken the rate at which the temperature rises), the water could
not circulate sufficiently fast to distribute the heat equally, the
temperature would gradually increase with the depth, until, if the
liquid could scarcely move at all, it would not be very different
from the temperature of the earth at the same depth. Now
suppose this state of things is reached, and further, that the
temperature of the water at any depth is such that it is only the
pressure of the liquid above it which keeps it from boiling, then,
if, as Bunsen supposes, a sudden generation of steam from
below lifts the whole column of water up, making some of it
overflow at the top, and so removing part of the pressure, every
layer of water thus raised will burst into steam, and the expan-
sion will throw the water, in the very act of boiling, out of the
tube, causing an eruption such as one sees.

So far, all seems well explained ; it is only when one examines
the theory and the geysers themselves carefully, that the great
difficulties in accepting it in this form are seen. Others have
suggested modifications of Bunsen's theory to account for the
diverse behaviour of different geysers. These are briefly stated
on page 166 of Captain Chittenden's very interesting book on
the Yellowstone Park ; but the writer feels that there is a good
deal more to be said, and hopes that what follows, if it does
not seem conclusive, will at least stimulate fresh thought,
observation, and, above all, experiment. He takes " Old
Faithful " as the best known geyser, in order that what he
has to say may be made more definite, and perhaps easier to
understand. Actual measurements show that the average out-
pour of this splendid fountain in a single eruption is not less
than 1,500,000 gallons: i.e., this quantity of water is poured
out on to the terraces surrounding the crater, and is not avail-
able for a second outburst. As one gallon equals a little more
than 277 cubic inches, this gives for the volume of water
ejected, 240,450 cubic feet. Now this passes through the

230 APPENDICES

geyser's mouth, which is six feet long by two feet wide (i.e.,
twelve square feet in area), in four and a half minutes, or 270
seconds. Thus, its average velocity, or rate of flow, measured
at the mouth of the geyser, during the four and a half minutes
of eruption, must be 74^ feet per second (about 50^ miles an
hour), and from this can be easily calculated the mean height
to which the fountain should rise // all its water were projected
with equal force ; this turns out to be almost exactly eighty-six
feet, which tallies well with observations.

Now " Old Faithful " rests sixty-five minutes between one
eruption and the next, and it is not unreasonable to suppose
that during that time the underground streams are accumulating
the material for the next eruption ; and to give a definite idea
of what the total magnitude of the water supply must be, you
have only to think of a stream six feet wide, two feet deep,
flowing steadily all through the sixty-five minutes at the very
considerable rate of a little over 5-^ feet per second. Now the
tube of the geyser is not left empty after the eruption, and this
is a most important point ; the water, it is true, sinks a few feet
in the crater, giving visitors a peep at the beautiful formation
with which the tube is lined, but in a very few minutes it begins
to rise slowly, crawling up inch by inch, till once again the
crater is full, and that, too, with very hot water. If the under-
ground river is flowing all through the period of rest, how do
you explain the facts that (i) the tube is filled manifestly with
new water directly after an eruption, and (2) then only rises a
few inches in an hour ? If it is steam from the bottom of the
tube that lifts the water up and makes the eruption begin, why
is the tube not emptied to its depths ? and the same question
may be asked without, so far as the author can see, a satis-
factory answer from either Mackenzie's, Comstock's, or Baring
Gould's theories. They all of them either empty the tube,
which Nature does not do, or fail to explain how the supply of
colder water is laid on in such a way as not to interfere with
the super-heating of the water in the tube, necessary for the
fulfilment of Bunsen's theory. It seems, in fact, impossible
that the water supply should be acting to refill the tube, except
during the eruption itself. Hence, if the stream be indeed
continuous — and it is very difficult to imagine it is not so — it
must be filling some cavity other than the tube during the
quiescent period, and it is the water flowing from this second
cavity into the tube which is the cause of the eruption of water,
whether Bunsen's theory comes into play to make that eruption

APPENDIX VI.

explosive or not.1 Since this flow nearly fills the tube afresh,
during the eruption, the rate of flow of the water from this
second cavity into the tube must be very nearly equal to the
rate of flow of water from the geyser. Thus we are forced to
the conclusion that in Old Faithful's case, and in all other
cases in which the geyser tube is left almost full after an erup-
tion, in spite of a great volume of water expelled, the eruption
is that of an intermittent, deep-seated spring, its violent character
being caused by the sudden boiling of super-heated water,
carried by the cistern's overflow up the geyser tube to places
where the pressure is not high enough to prevent the water
from boiling. The hotter water, being lighter than the cooler,
remains at the top, whilst the colder water, flowing in from
below, raises it, forcing it upwards, as a piston would.

Suppose abcdef (Fig. i) represents the geyser tube directly
after an eruption (of Old Faithful's kind), and let us assume

Fig.

i.

that equilibrium has been established by the fall of the water
in the " outcrop " tube d efio the level of the geyser's mouth a.
If the rise of temperature with increase in depth below the
earth's surface is fairly rapid, the water in the tube will be most
rapidly heated at 6 and d, and the steam rising from b will
rapidly heat all the water in the parts of the tube a b, b c. The
temperature of the water in the tube between d and e will not
be raised nearly so rapidly, because (i) the total cross-section
of the tube or tubes which constitute this part of the geyser
tube is probably greater than the corresponding cross-sections
at any other part of the tube ; and (2) because cold water is
continually flowing into this part of the tube, and sinking to
the lowest part d, or, at any rate, tending to do so, by virtue

It is most improbable that the second cavity's filling or emptying should
be accurately timed to the eruption from the tube, if the latter is caused by
some action such as Bunsen's theory would indicate, which does not apply
to the water in the second cavity.

II

232 APPENDICES

of the fact that cold water is heavier than hot; and (3) because
d may well be much higher than b. Thus after a time steam
will collect in the upper part of the bend at c, whilst it will
either be condensed in the longer column of water between
b and a, or rising through the whole length of the column b a,
will quietly escape through the boiling water, as indeed it may
be seen to do in many instances to be found in the Park.
Meanwhile the upper layers of the water in c d will have been
raised by the steam rising in b c to the temperature of the steam
itself; but the rest of the water in c d will not be nearly so hot,
first because the cold water constantly flowing into e d prevents
the formation of steam at d, if not entirely, at least to anything
like the extent to which it is formed at b, and secondly, the
very poor thermal conductivity of water would make the effect
of the hot upper layer g h negligible, so far as its heating effect
on the layers below it is concerned.

During this first part of the action we have, therefore, the
steam formed in b c trapped at c, part of it condensed by the
cooler water between c and d, a condensing action which will
be continued for some time after steam has begun to collect
at c, and which will make the level of the water between c and d
higher than the level of the water between b and c — k in the
figure. All this time fresh water has been flowing into the part
of the tube fed, but by the well-known principles of Hydro-
statics, the water and steam in the geyser tube will be in
equilibrium, so long as the difference of level of the water in
the tube's branches a b, b c, is equal to the difference of level
of the water in the two branches c d, df, i.e., so long as w x (in
the figure) is equal to y z (this obviously neglects the effect of
the different relative densities of the water in the different
branches of the tube : the correction to be made when this is
considered is, that equilibrium will be maintained when the
difference of level y z is rather less than w x). What happens
next must depend on the conditions which obtain in each
particular geyser ; on the rate of inflow of fresh and cold water,
on the dimensions and slope of the tubes, on the rate at which
heat is communicated to their various parts, conditions which
no doubt occur in endless variety; but whatever these may be,
sooner or later there will come an explosive eruption, as the
following considerations will make evident. Suppose that when
the trapped steam ceases to condense in the part of the tube
c d, the levels are those drawn in the figure, since the water
between, at g, is practically at the temperature of the trapped

A1TKXDIX VI. 233

steam, it is evident that if a fresh portion of the water between
b and k is turned into steam, the increased pressure in k c £
must tend to lower the level of the liquid on both sides of c,
in reality a little of this fresh steam will condense at g since,
unlike the water at k, the temperature of g has not been raised
along with the pressure of the steam ; and since the water has
been taken from b k to form the steam, and not from g </, and
also because the water in // d <• is not so dense as that in a h k,
the level at k will sink rather faster than at & besides the fact
that the growing head of water in cf tends to maintain equili-
brium under the growing steam pressure in the steam-trap,
without making any change of level of the water at g necessary,
and may in some cases actually do so. Thus the water-level
in b c sinks, whilst water either gently rises, or overflows at a,
the difference of the pressure at a and k (wherever k may be)
remaining the same as the difference of pressure between g
and v (both g and y gradually changing).

Suppose that the level of k sinks to /, after this has happened
any steam generated at b will escape at a (unless condensed on
the way), and the level of the water in the geyser throat will
sink as the water in the tube a b boils away ; but all the time
the head of water in / e d is increasing, and the cool water in
h d is creeping up towards c : presently it reaches the top of
the bend, and begins to overflow at 0, slowly at first, perhaps
with more or less violent ebullition, as it comes into contact
with the sides of the tube between o and /, which have for
some time been out of contact with liquid water, and may
consequently have risen to a very high temperature. Such
explosive generation of steam will cause violent pulsations in
the water at the mouth of the geyser, and may well bring about
Bunsen boiling, and a very rapid fall of pressure in a b and
therefore in b c, causing a full eruption of the geyser ; but even
if not, the ever accumulating waters in f/will cause a con-
tinually increasing stream of cooler and cooler water to flow
over at o till this cooler water either gradually or suddenly
condenses the last steam in c I ; fora moment, in the latter
he water in the geyser throat may be pressed down the
tube some distance by atmospheric pressure, but only momen-
tarily ; for the waters in c/are no longer balanced, they drive
the waters in d c fast before them, liquid continuity is re-
established throughout the tube, the contents of a b are
violently raised by the water piston, and an eruption occurs,
not ending completely, till the state of things with which we

234 APPENDICES

supposed the cycle of operations to begin has again come about,
and the mouth of the geyser is left full of water once more.

If the beginning of the eruption of the geyser is to be looked
upon as due to a sudden evolution of steam raising the water
in a b, and so producing Bunsen boiling, we may explain the
generation of this steam either as above, or thus : It is well
known that if water is spilt upon a surface which is heated
considerably above the boiling-point it does not burst into
steam at once, but evaporates quietly, and that it is easier to
perform this experiment with hot water than with cold. When,
however, the temperature of the surface is lowered, and the
cushion of steam which before separated the water from the
hot surface is condensed, so that the water comes into actual
contact with the surface — the latter being still very hot — a
sudden burst of steam is the result, which may exert enormous
pressure if the quantity of water and the extent of surface next
it are considerable, and if the space in which the action occurs
is closely confined.

To return to the diagram of the geyser tube : the first drib-
lets of hot water running over at o, on to the sides of the
branch c b, possibly intensely heated, might easily pass into
this so-called " spheroidal " state, and this water might lodge
on its way down to / in cavities and hollows in the lower sur-
face of the tube ; before long there must come a time when
the temperature of the rock under these evaporating pools is
reduced to a point when the supply of heat is insufficient to
maintain the formation of the cushion of steam necessary to
keep the hot water from coming into actual contact with the
rock itself. Perhaps this may happen soon after the water
begins to dribble over at o, perhaps not until the tube b c is
very nearly full of liquid, but whenever it does happen, if it
happens at all, there will be a sudden explosive generation
of steam, which will drive the waters violently down both c b
and c d ; the head of water in df will doubtless be raised some-
what, but the steam will not in general be able to overcome
the resistance in this direction, owing to the height of the out-
crop, if not from its nature, which is almost certainly of a kind
to resist any very sudden passage of water, though it allows
fairly rapid percolation, and also the rapid passage of air.
On the side cba the steam meets with a far less powerful
resistance, and gives that upward lift to the waters in the
branch a b which is just what is required to bring about
Bunsen boiling and an eruption ; the head of water in df,

APPENDIX VI

increased by the explosion of the water in the spheroidal state
into steam, reasserts its supremacy, the level of g rises
rapidly to c, liquid continuity is set up afresh in the branches
of the geyser tube, and finally the geyser throat is left full, or
\x-ry nearly so, when the eruption is finished.

It will be seen that the level of the water in the outcrop
tubes (on the right in Fig. i) must be above a when the
eruption begins, but since all the geysers I have seen lie along
the bottoms of valleys copiously supplied with water (in the

Fig. 2.

Fig. 3-

Fig. 4.

Fig- 5-

case of the Yellowstone Park by the thick woods with which
the hills on both sides are covered), neither this, nor the
quantity of water required, seem to be difficulties. The shape
of the outcrop tubes, as drawn, is also of a kind likely to occur
in the spaces between tipped up strata, which frequently
follow the lines of a basin, giving rise under certain circum-
stances to artesian springs ; and it seems far from unlikely that
some of the boiling springs are in fact artesian wells of great
depth, whose borings through the upper impervious soil (r/cfc
Fig. 2.) have been made by the expansive force of steam gene-

236 APPENDICES

rated beneath from water which has filtered down from the
hills between two layers of impervious soil, and there has been
heated by the earth's internal fires till the tension became so
great that, unable to find any natural vent, it burst a way
through the hard roof of its long, shallow chamber, up which
the heated waters rushed impetuously into the open air. In
any case the silica, soluble in hot water only under great
pressure, is deposited on the sides of the geyser pipe near the
earth's surface, where the pressure is less, and probably for a
hundred feet or more below, and this deposit prevents the
waters from escaping laterally and from mixing with other
waters in neighbouring outlets. Fig. 2 gives a section of the
formation necessary for the artesian well, the permeable soil
being shaded, and the impervious above and below it left
blank. Now suppose that the subterranean forces produce
local upheavals of the strata : we thus naturally pass to Fig. 3,
where we see the same arrangement of soils, but waved in
form, the exit pipe of the spring rising where there is least
resistance, i.e., from the highest point of the highest bend.
From this to the arrangement sketched in Figs. 4 and 5 is an
easy transition, needing only a " fault " to displace the strata
vertically, but more over one part of the basin than the other,
and in Figure 5 denudation has planed off the surface, the
slight rise about a being in most cases due to the silica
deposited by the geyser itself. It is clear that if the waved
geyser tube does not pass through a region hot enough to
cause the formation of steam, the curves would make no
difference to the character of the spring at a, which would be
an ordinary artesian of more or less hot water flowing con-
stantly ; but if steam is formed in the geyser tube we shall
have the condition of things already discussed. Bunsen boil-
ing may come into action, but there is no need for it ; at any
rate the eruption need not be started by Bunsen boiling, and
so one great difficulty is removed, for in the case of " Old
Faithful," if his tube be of the same cross-section throughout
as it is at the crater (i.e., 1 2 square feet), it must be no less
than 15,200 feet long — a length nearly equal to the height of
Mont Blanc ; and if Bunsen's theory is to be applicable, the
tube must be at all events so narrow that the water is not free
to circulate. If, however, the explanation just given be correct,
the tube need not be narrow, nor need it descend to any very
great depth.

The difficulty of accepting Bunsen's theory as the complete

vi. 237

explanation of the action of the geysers is still further seen if
imiru' more carefully the rate at which the boiling-point
of water rises when the pressure increases uniformly. This is
shown graphically in the illustration, Fig. 6, by the curved
line A B C D E, the points on which are found by plotting
depths in feet along the horizontal, and tlu: boiling-points of
water at the corresponding depths along the vertical.

Thus the point C is on the curve, because at -j^ofccl depth
below the surface of the water in the geyser pipe the tempera-
ture to which water must be raised to make it boil has been
ascertained by experiment to be 217°. Singularly, D shows
that at 1,000 feet depth the temperature must be 234° C, and
so on. This diagram tacitly assumes (i) that the temperature
of the earth at the surface of the ground is at the boiling-point
of the water there — i.e., 92*2° C. — which is the most favourable
supposition for Bunsen's theory possible ; and (2) that the
pressure increases directly as the depth, i.e., it neglects (a) the
effect of the expansion of the water by heat, which would
diminish its density, and (6) the compression of the water
produced by the weight of the superincumbent water, which
would increase its density, but not so much as the heat effect
diminishes it. If corrections were made for (a) and (6),
the effect might well be to make the curve a little flatter,
i.e., at considerable depths the boiling-point of water would
be a little lower than it would otherwise be. Now consider
the straight lines on the same figure : that which cuts the curve
at B is a line representing a temperature of i° C. for every
5 feet of depth — a rise far greater than has ever been observed,
even in volcanic districts ; the next to the right stands for a rise
of i° C. in every 15 feet ; and the next to the right again for
i° F. in every 15 feet (or i° C. in every 27) — still a very rapid
rise, but one which is still above the rates of rise met with in
Nature. Now the first of these lines shows that down to a
depth of about 500 feet the temperature necessary to make the
water boil at any particular depth will be greater than the
temperature of the earth at that depth ; at 500 feet below the
surface the temperature of the earth will just be able to make
the water boil under the pressure at that depth ; and every
where below 500 feet the temperature of the earth will be
above the temperature necessary to make the water boil, the
difference between the two temperatures rapidly increasing
with the depth ; so that it is evident that // there is little or no
influx of colder water from beneath, steam will be very rapidly

238 APPENDICES

generated at depths below 500 feet, and the conditions will be
favourable for an eruption of the Bunsen type, the cooler
water in the upper part of the tube being expelled first, about
one-fifth of it turning into steam, and then the more highly
heated water from the lower part of the tube, a much greater
proportion of which will become steam on emerging. So that
the eruption will begin with a fountain of boiling water, and
end, if the tube be deep, with a mixture of steam and water,
of which the former may preponderate, and the tube will be
left almost or quite empty, unless the ejected water is caught

in a basin round the crater, and so flows back into the geyser's
mouth as soon as the emission of steam which closes the
eruption has sufficiently subsided to permit of its re-entrance.
In this latter case the tube might be left (say) two-thirds full,
or perhaps more. But there must be a supply of water to
make up for what is wasted in steam, and the difficult point to
settle is, how this enters so as not to interfere with the super-
heating. Once more one is driven to suppose that as the
geyser tube fills up from below, the pressure of the accumu-
lated water chokes off the supply ; that a stationary period
follows, during which the heating goes on, resulting in an

APPENDIX VI. 239

eruption of the Bunsen type. This may serve for the expla-
nation of geysers like the " Minute Man," the " Economic,"
the " Vixen," and others ; but the explanation totally fails
where the quantity of water ejected is very great, and in spite
of this the tube is left full, as in " Old Faithful's " case. //
must be carefully remembered, too, that the rise of i° C. in
5 feet postulated is not to be considered at nil likely to occur.
If we turn to a more probable rise, but still one which has
nrvur been verified, such as i° C. in 27 feet,1 the difficulty of
accepting Bunsen's theory to account for even small geysers
like the above seems much greater; for a glance at the illus-
tration, Fig. 6, will show that the earth temperature line corre-
sponding to this rise will not cut the water curve until the depth
is at least 4,000 or 5,000 feet : so that // there is no circulation
of the water in tlie tube at all, the temperature will not rise
high enough anywhere in the first 5,000 feet for the water to
boil ; and we can hardly imagine that such toy fountains as
the above-mentioned geysers are played from tubes of such a
length as 5,000 feet, or even of 1,000, so that even these cases,
which have been considered as the most perfect examples of
Bunsen's theory, demand (if that theory is to be maintained)
a rate of rise of temperature, far more rapid than any yet
observed, if " the sudden generation of steam near the bottom
of the tube " is to lift the heated column of water. If the tube
is supposed wide enough to allow the circulation of the heated
waters from below, the explanation might at first sight seem
easier j for we can imagine masses of water (not steam) rising
to places where the pressure might not be sufficient to keep
them from bursting into steam, and that, too, with increasing
energy, as all the water grows hotter until a sudden and ex-
plosive ebullition raises the water above, and a "Bunsen"
eruption follows. But this demands free circulation for the
water, for referring to the diagram again, and taking the rise of
temperature as i° C. in 15 feet (a very rapid rise, though
perhaps not impossible in a region such as Yellowstone Park),
we see that if the geyser tube was (say) 600 feet deep, the
water at the bottom would be presumably at 132° C. Now
suppose this water rose, by virtue of its being lighter, losing
on its way (say) 10° C., in warming water it met with, it would
be ready to burst into steam (at least about one-fifth of it
would) at about fifty feet below the surface, which the boiling
point curve shows is the depth at which water would boil at
1 Judd gives i° C. in 36 feet the maximum rate of rise yet found.

240 APPENDICES

122° C. But it is evident that for masses of water to rise
from 600 feet to 50 feet, i.e., 550 feet, through cooler
water (the water at 50 feet depth would be rather above
96° C., but of course could not be above 122° C.), and
only cool by 10° C., demands almost free circulation for
the water. In parting with some of its heat on its upward
course, it would shrink, and so lose some of its buoyancy;
but the most serious objection to this explanation is, that even
if the temperature rises by as much as i° C. in every 15 feet
depth, the density of water must alter so very slowly from
point to point that the currents started by this alteration must
be exceedingly slow ; and we are practically driven back to the
conclusion that if Bunsen's theory is to apply at all, steam
must be the agent which warms the water in the tube and lifts
the super-heated column, and against this view we have already
urged the two powerful objections of the great depth necessary
for even the small geyser tubes (they would throw out much
more water if their tubes were very long, or heated from a very
great depth), and also the difficulty of assigning the time of
supply, and the place where the supply enters the tube, so that
it shall not interfere with the formation of steam. None of
these difficulties remain if the " artesian spring " explanation
suggested in this paper is accepted as correct. As before
stated, the tube need not be narrow, it need not descend to
any great depth. This theory also explains where the supply
enters, the cause of the intermittency of eruption, and how it
is that the geyser tube is left nearly full just after it has played.
It allows ample time for the water to acquire its charge of
siliceous matter, and moreover requires no special construction
which is not already known to exist in nature in many places ;
it does not demand any special point for the application of the
heat, the rise of temperature everywhere beneath the surface
is sufficient. It supplies a key both to the large number of
geysers and their different characters, and explains why the
birth of a geyser should be attended with an eruption of such
terrific violence as to shake the whole region ; and it is
adequate for the solution of such a problem as the Excelsior
presents. Moreover the basin-like lie of the ground occupied
by these splendid natural fountains, of which the very names
of the districts are a constant reminder, is seen to be neces-
sary for their existence.1

1 Read before the Physical Society of London, February 7, 1898.

APPENDIX VII.

241

APPENDIX VII

PHYSIOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS

The following observations may interest physiologists.
They were made with due care, on the summit of Pike's
iVak, during the morning of September 7, 1897, by the author,
on five men : A, B, C, D, and E.

Temperature of sleeping room at 8.15 a.m., minus i° C.

Tempera-
ture of
body in
degrees K.

Respirations
per
minute.

Pulse per
minute.

AUC of
subject.

Remarks.

A.

98-4° F.

(normal).

15 to 16

126 to 127

29

Has lived on the
summit during the last
5 days.

B.

97!4° F.

26

88

Between
20 and 30

Has lived on the
summit during the last
6 days. Has suffered
from asthma.

C.

98-6° F.

14

78 to 79

33

Has lived on the
summit during the last
7 days.

I).

97-8° F.

18

80

26

Has lived here 14
days, and "prefers the
high altitude."

1 .

97-1° F.

IS

75

37

Has stayed here
about 1 8 hours.

The temperature of the body was ascertained by keeping a
small medical registering thermometer under the tongue for
not less than four consecutive minutes, with the mouth shut.
The pulse was taken at the wrist.

UNWIN BROTHER^
WOKING AND LONDON

I